While a really swinging beat or rhythm will make sophisticated dancers perform quite extraordinary terpsichorean feats, we also know that the vast amount of social
“The real history of music is not respectable. Far from it. Neither is it boring. Breakthroughs almost always come from provocateurs and insurgents, and they
“I submit that there is nothing that anybody in the world has ever done that is more civilized or sophisticated than to dance elegantly, which
In 1991, I had been chasing the music of Joe “King” Oliver and Louis Armstrong for seven or eight years. By “chasing,” I mean I
I’ve never been a Bird lover—for no good reason other than that his playing feels cool, detached, even saucy. It lacks the breathy soul of
On November 11, 1918, a 17-year-old Louis “Dipper” Armstrong, driving a coal cart around his down-and-out New Orleans neighborhood, heard a commotion. World War I
“Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time.” — H. L. Mencken In 1900, editorializing on jazz and “other black music,” Etude
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance offers us one of American film’s great moments. U.S. Senator Ransom Stoddard (James Stewart) has gained his position of
