Mezz Mezzrow and the Disciples of Swing

Introduction Milton “Mezz” Mezzrow was a jazz musician/marijuana seller and author (with writer Bernard Wolfe) of a singular autobiography, Really The Blues. The book, set largely in the 1920s-’30s, is one of the few autobiographies written by an early jazz musician and is arguably the most entertaining and informative. That said, writing about Mezzrow in 2023 is a bit of a minefield. For one thing, the depiction of Mezzrow’s life and times as told in his own, highly subjective voice is so vivid that it’s easy to be carried away and pay little heed to the historical gaps or inaccuracies in the book. Secondly, Mezzrow was a white Jewish man who identified completely with African-American culture. He lived in black communities and married a black woman. When he was sent to prison, he told the guards he was “negro”—also the race on his draft card. Much of Really the Blues is taken up with differentiating black from white culture—always to the detriment of the latter. Today, many people see such a position as privileged posturing. If you read the book, you can draw your own conclusions about Mezzrow as an object of cultural scrutiny, but his actions—not just his words—show that he was sincerely in thrall to jazz and black musicians. And, while there are varying opinions about his playing, he was, at his worst, competent and at his best, convincing. Certainly, he