Celebrating Bird: the Triumph of Charlie Parker by Gary Giddins Paperback: 208 pages; $17.95 University of Minnesota Press www.upress.umn.edu ISBN: 9780816690411 One of things I
Ricky Riccardi’s Stomp Off, Let’s Go: The Early Years of Louis Armstrong (Oxford University Press, 2025) is not only the best jazz biography that I’ve
Of all of the major jazz orchestra leaders of the 1930s and ’40s, Artie Shaw undoubtedly led the most big bands, six during 1936-49. His
When Andy Senior, esteemed editor of The Syncopated Times, and Larry Melton, a frequent contributor to this periodical and a founder of the Scott Joplin
The standard biographical approach in which the subject is born, did remarkable things, then died gets upended by Jack Chambers’s new Duke Ellington book. Titled
The Boswell Sisters (Connie, Martha and Vet) were arguably the greatest jazz vocal group of all time, ranking at the top with the Mills Brothers
Author Aaron J. Johnson covers a lot of ground in Jazz Radio America, detailing the rise and fall of stations and their changing formats, the
Ricky Riccardi, who has his dream job as the Director of Research Collections for the Louis Armstrong House Museum, began his trilogy of definitive Louis
The story of Ernie Fields begins, as it must, with the visit from John Hammond. This was in the late 1930s, when Hammond was prowling
Paul Whiteman was a formidable figure in jazz/popular music history. The facts of Whiteman’s career have been well covered by The Syncopated Times. His place
Harry “The Hipster” Gibson (1915-91) was a unique character in jazz history. In some ways he was the jazz equivalent to rock and roll’s Jerry
To say that Artie Shaw (1910-2004) was a unique individual would be an understatement. A perfectionist who mastered the clarinet, Shaw treated his musicians well
By 1960 the second revival of New Orleans traditional jazz was well underway, but the older black musicians who still played it had few places
Which music qualifies as jazz has been a hot topic for over a hundred years. From the beginning there were attempts to both define and
Early Jazz, a paperback book by Fumi Tomita, has as its subtitle “A Concise Introduction, from Its Beginnings through 1929.” Tomita conceived of his book
The book In With the In Crowd, named after Ramsey Lewis’ big 1965 hit, has two major threads. One thread is factual, devoted to giving
The debate over what constitutes American music raged particularly fiercely in the early years of the 20th century as jazz invaded our ears. It took
“It seemed the perfect way to fight my war.”– Josephine Baker No American was ever more beloved by the French nation than Josephine Baker. In
It was one of the finest jazz television series ever. During 1956-58, Stars Of Jazz aired 130 episodes. Hosted by Bobby Troup, it was a
Big Joe Turner: Feel So Fine, Derek Coller’s exhaustive bio/discography of the legendary alumnus of Kansas City’s colorful past has been recently published to critical
Sometimes, those of us interested in music of the late 19th or early 20th century feel fortunate at the number of recordings available for us
The best-known examples of interracial jazz recordings are the 1935 and ’36 sides cut by the Benny Goodman Trio which included black pianist Teddy Wilson.
Dust Bowl To Disney is a fine book. It’s an autobiography by traditional jazz cornetist Danny Alguire. When my long-time friend and colleague Hal Smith
During 1941-46, viewers all over the United States had an opportunity to see musical numbers on a visual jukebox. Rather than put a nickel in
