7180: Felix Mendelssohn — The Prodigy Who Rescued Bach from Two Centuries of Silence | pplpod
Felix Mendelssohn composed a string octet at sixteen that professionals twice his age could not match. But his most consequential act was conducting Bach’s St. Matthew Passion in 1829, a work unheard ...
16 Jun 18min
7179: Ma Rainey — The Fearless, Unapologetic Mother of the Blues | pplpod
Ma Rainey was performing the blues before the genre had a name. She dressed in gold and ostrich feathers, sang about desire with a frankness that scandalized polite society, and built a touring career...
16 Jun 20min
7178: Jimi Hendrix — The Quiet Genius Beyond the Burning Guitar | pplpod
The defining image of Jimi Hendrix was a guitar on fire at Monterey Pop. The reality was a shy, soft-spoken man who practiced obsessively, heard music in colors, and pushed electric guitar technique f...
16 Jun 24min
7177: The Rolling Stones — How Rock’s Greatest Outlaws Built an Empire on Rebellion | pplpod
The Rolling Stones were marketed as the band your parents should fear. What started as genuine blues devotion became the most carefully managed outlaw brand in entertainment — a billion-dollar empire ...
16 Jun 20min
7176: Muddy Waters — How a Mississippi Sharecropper Plugged In and Electrified the Blues | pplpod
Muddy Waters was recorded on a Mississippi plantation by Alan Lomax for the Library of Congress. Within a decade he had moved to Chicago, plugged in an electric guitar, and invented a sound that becam...
16 Jun 24min
7175: Madonna — How She Hacked the Music Industry and Never Stopped Reinventing | pplpod
Madonna arrived in New York in 1977 with thirty-five dollars and a conviction she would be the biggest star in the world. Within seven years she was exactly that, maintaining her position through rele...
16 Jun 19min
7174: Henry Purcell — The Baroque Genius Whose Music Inspired the Power Chord | pplpod
Henry Purcell died at thirty-six and left behind music so emotionally direct it still sounds modern. He wrote the first great English opera, reinvented the Anglican anthem, and composed funeral music ...
16 Jun 25min
7173: Dizzy Gillespie — How the Clown Prince of Jazz Reinvented American Music | pplpod
Dizzy Gillespie wore a beret, puffed his cheeks into balloons, and played with his trumpet bell bent skyward. The showmanship made people laugh. The music behind it was the most advanced jazz anyone h...
16 Jun 20min
