Reading Jazz: a Gathering of Autobiography, Reportage, and Criticism from 1919 to Now

Jacket Description/Flap: "Comprehensive and intelligently organized. . . . Jazz aficionados . . . should be grateful to have so much good writing on the subject in one place."--"The New York Times Book Review "Alluring. . . . Capture[s] much of the breadth of the music, as well as the passionate debates it has stirred, more vividly than any other jazz anthology to date."--"Chicago Tribune No musical idiom has inspired more fine writing than jazz, and nowhere has that writing been presented with greater comprehensiveness and taste than in this glorious collection. In Reading Jazz, editor Robert Gottlieb combs through eighty years of autobiography, reportage, and criticism by the music's greatest players, commentators, and fans to create what is at once a monumental tapestry of jazz history and testimony to the elegance, vigor, and variety of jazz writing. Here are Jelly Roll Morton, recalling the whorehouse piano players of New Orleans in 1902; Whitney Balliett, profiling clarinetist Pee Wee Russell; poet Philip Larkin, with an eloquently dyspeptic jeremiad against bop. Here, too, are the voices of Billie Holiday and Charles Mingus, Albert Murray and Leonard Bernstein, Stanley Crouch and LeRoi Jones, reminiscing, analyzing, celebrating, and settling scores. For anyone who loves the music--or the music of great prose--Reading Jazz is indispensable. "The ideal gift for jazzniks and boppers everywhere. . . . It gathers the best and most varied jazz writing of more than a century."--"Sunday Times (London) Marc Notes: Originally published: New York: Pantheon, 1996.; 8; Gottlieb brings together more than 150 excerpts from books, journals, magazines and newspapers, creating a monumental anthology of essays about jazz.. Table of Contents: PART 1: AUTOBIOGRAPHYJelly Roll MortonSidney BechetLouis ArmstrongWillie "The Lion" SmithDuke EllingtonSonny GreerLeora HendersonArt HodesBuck ClaytonHoagy CarmichaelEddie CondonMary Lou WilliamsCab CallowayLionel HamptonJohn HammondCount BasieBillie HolidayMezz MezzrowArtie ShawCharlie BarnetMax GordonAnita O'DayMilt HintonArt BlakeyMilt GablerMiles DavisWillie RuffArt PepperCharles MingusHamton HawesPaul DesmondCecil TaylorAnthony Braxton PART 2: REPORTAGEKing Oliver: A Very Personal Memoir by Edmond Souchon, M. D. A Music of the Streets by Fredrick TurnerThe Blues of Jimmy by Vincent McHughJack Teagarden by Charles Edward SmithEven His Feet Look Sad by Whitney BalliettThe Cutting Sessions by Rex StewartThomas "Fats" Waller by John S. WilsonSunshine Always Opens Out by Whitney BalliettThe Poet: Bill Evans by Gene LeesBlack Like Him by Francis DavisThe House in the Heart by Bobby ScottThe Big Bands by George T. Simon Homage to Bunny by George FrazierThe Spirit of Jazz by Otis FergusonThe Mirror of Swing by Gary GiddinsJimmie Lunceford by Ralph J. GleasonTwo Rounds of the Battling Dorseys by Tommy Dorsey and Jimmy DorseyJazz Orchestra in Residence, 1971 by Carol EastonFlying Home by Rudi BleshThe Fabulous Gypsy by Gilbert S. McKeanMinton's by Ralph EllisonMinton's Playhouse by Dizzy GillespieAt the Hi-De-Ho by Hampton HawesBird by Miles Davis Waiting for Dizzy by Gene LeesAn Evening with Monk by Dan MorgensternTheloious and Me by Orrin KeepnewsJohn Coltrane by Nat HentoffBessie Smith: Poet by Murray KemptonMahalia Jackson by George T. SimonLady Day Has Her Say by Billie HolidayThe Untold Story of the International Sweethearts fo Rhythm by Marian McPartlandA Starr is Reborn by Gary GiddinsMoonbeam Moscowitz: Sylvia Syms by Whitney BallietThe Lindy by Marshall and Jean StearnsA Night at the Five Spot by Martin WilliamsYou Dig It, Sir by Lillian RossJohnny Green by Fred HallJazz in America by Jean-Paul SartreDon't Shoot--We're Americans! by Steve VoceGoffin, " Esquire," and the Moldy Figs by Leonard Feather PART 3: CRITICISMBechet and Jazz Visit Europe, 1919 by Ernst-Alexandre AnsermetHarpsichords and Jazz Trumpets by Roger Pryor DodgeConclusions by Winthrop SargeantHas Jazz Influenced the Symphony? by Gene Krupa and Leonard BernsteinNo Jazz is an Island by William GrossmanThe Unreal Jazz by Hugues PanassieAll What Jazz? by Philip LarkinThe Musical Achievement by Eric HobsbawmKing Oliver by Larry GusheeBix Beiderbecke by Benny GreenJames P. Johnson by Max HarrisonColeman Hawkins by Dan MorgensternNot for the Left Hand Alone by Martin WilliamsTime and the Tenor by Graham ColombeBop by LeRoi JonesOn Bird, Bird-Watching, and Jazz by Ralph EllisonWhy Did Ellington "Remake" His Masterpiece? by Andre HodeirOn the Corner: The Sellout of Miles Davis by Stanley CrouchSpace Is the Place by Gene SantoroEasy to Love by Dudley MooreBessie Smith by Humphrey LytteltonBillie Holiday by Benny GreenCult of the White Goddess by Will FriedwaldElla Fitzgerald by Henry PleasantsThe Divine Sarah by Gunther SchullerThe Blues as Dance Music by Albert MurrayLocal Jazz by James Lincoln CollierFifty Years of "Body and Soul" by Gary GiddinsEverycat and Birdland Mon Amor by Francis DavisBird Land by Stanley CrouchLouis Armstrong: an American Genius by Dan MorgensternA Bad Idea, Poorly Executed...by Orrin KeepnewsPublisher Marketing: Gottlieb brings together more than 150 excerpts from books, journals, magazines and newspapers, creating a monumental anthology of essays about jazz. Review Citations:

New York Times 10/31/1999 pg. 40 (EAN 9780679781110, Paperback)

Publishers Weekly 10/07/1996 pg. 51 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover)

Kirkus Reviews 09/15/1996 pg. 1391 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover)

Booklist 10/15/1996 pg. 395 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover) - *Starred Review

Library Journal 11/01/1996 pg. 70 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover) - *Starred Review

New York Times 12/22/1996 pg. 15 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover)

Wilson Public Library Catalog 01/01/1997 pg. 83 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover)

Wilson Public Library Catalog 01/01/1998 pg. 485 (EAN 9780679442516, Hardcover)

Contributor Bio:  Gottlieb, Robert Robert Gottlieb is Henry R. Luce Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Director of the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute at Occidental College. Mark Vallianatos is Research Coordinator at the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute at Occidental College. Regina M. Freer is Associate Professor of Politics at Occidental College. Peter Dreier is E. P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics and Director of the Urban and Environmental Policy Program at Occidental College.