Jazz In The Bittersweet Blues Of Life

Set in the studio, on the stage, and in great cities and small towns across the country, this book captures life on the road for Marsalis and his musicians, evoking the ritual and renewal, energy and spirituality. 6 photos.

In this beautiful book, Pulitzer Prize—winning musician and composer Wynton Marsalis draws upon lessons he’s learned from a lifetime in jazz–lessons that can help us all move to higher ground. With wit and candor he demystifies the music that is the birthright of every American and demonstrates how a real understanding of the central idea of jazz–the unique balance between self-expression and sacrifice for the common good exemplified on the bandstand–can enrich every aspect of our lives, from the bedroom to the boardroom, from the schoolroom to City Hall. Along the way, Marsalis helps us understand the life-changing message of the blues, reveals secrets about playing–and listening–and passes on wisdom he has gleaned from working with three generations of great musicians. Illuminating and inspiring, Moving to Higher Ground is a master class on jazz and life, conducted by a brilliant American artist.

This book offers an entry point for understanding the comprehensive way this uniquely American artistic form has influenced literature, art, film, and other art forms, while also providing a cultural space for political commentary or social critique.

Greg Clark welcomes his readers by asking them to accompany him on a trip to a New Orleans club, where the warmth of the music and the warmth of the audience instill a special feeling of communion, of getting along. Clark’s book treats the idea that jazz demands from those who make it as well as those who listen a form of life that substantiates the seemingly impossible American value that is e pluribus unum. The process of getting along (in communication, in community) is something the great student of culture and rhetoric, Kenneth Burke, spent his life trying to describe. Clark has found that jazz, as an activity and a cultural form, goes a long way toward illustrating that process. Jazz is often described as democratic. Burke’s rhetorical and aesthetic ideas explain how this is so. Working with others to address immediate problems they share can align for a time individuals who are otherwise very different. That is what jazz does: it enables people who are different and even in conflict with each other to combine in cooperation toward an end that matters to all of them just now. And this, too, is what civic life in democratic cultures demands. In chapters that deal with such issues as what jazz does and how jazz works, Clark uses examples from jazz history (from Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines to Miles Davis and Bill Evans), but also from contemporary jazz, both recorded and live, e.g., pianist Jonathan Batiste and his "Social Music,” drummer Terri Lyne Carrington and her collaborative "Mosaic Project,” or the newly emergent vocalist, Cecile Mclorin Salvant, all of this in the service of making improvisation and ensemble work yield the experience of transcendence that results from intense engagement with jazz as aesthetic form (for players and listeners alike). The resulting book is a study of jazz in the context of American aspirations toward democratic interaction and a study of Kenneth Burke’s democratic rhetorical theory and practice as essentially aesthetic in function and effect. Marcus Roberts, the much-lionized ”neoclassical” pianist, crafts a Foreword that points to practical ways these ideas can work to improve and inspire both musicians and citizens.

Jazz: Research and Pedagogy is the third edition of an annotated bibliography to books, recordings, videos, and websites in the field of jazz. Since the publication of the 2nd edition in 1995, the quantity and quality of books on jazz research, performance, and teaching materials have increased. Although the 1995 book was the most comprehensive annotated jazz bibliography published to that date, several books on research, performance, and teaching materials were omitted. In addition, given the proliferation of new books in all jazz areas since 1995, the need for a new, comprehensive, and annotated reference book on jazz is apparent. Multiply indexed, this book will serve as an excellent tool for librarians, researchers, and scholars in sorting through the massive amount of new material that has appeared in the field over the last decade.

Current Jazz Trumpet Legends By: Larry Kemp Current Jazz Trumpet Legends, Volume 3 in the Jazz Trumpet Legends series, is an examination of the lives and contributions of jazz trumpeters born after July 1, 1938. Included are Lee Morgan, Bobby Shew, Lew Soloff, Woody Shaw, Arturo Sandoval, Wynton Marsalis, along with scores of other men and women who created jazz with a trumpet. This is an essential guide for the student of jazz, those interested in history, and those who just like to read entertaining true stories about the most colorful people. Current Jazz Trumpet Legends is the most comprehensive book on the subject. More than 340 trumpeters are discussed. There is a listing of female trumpeters and a listing of men whose first names might lead you to think they are female, but they aren’t. There is an index of trumpeters discussed in this volume and an index of all trumpeters in the three volume series. The book concludes with a list of people whose help is acknowledged. The scholarship involved is impeccable, while the text reads as easily as a novel. Current Jazz Trumpet Legends is the third of three volumes of profiles of jazz trumpeters organized chronologically by date of birth. The first volume, Early Jazz Trumpet covers those trumpeters born before September 1, 1924. The second volume, Modern Jazz Trumpet Legends covers those born between 1925 and July 1, 1938. The third volume, Current Jazz Trumpet Legends, covers those born after July 1, 1938.

Jazz is a music born in the United States and formed by a combination of influences. In its infancy, jazz was a melting pot of military brass bands, work songs and field hollers of the United States slaves during the 19th century, European harmonies and forms, and the rhythms of Africa and the Caribbean. Later, the blues and the influence of Spanish and French Creoles with European classical training nudged jazz further along in its development. As it moved through the swing era of the 1930s, bebop of the 1940s, and cool jazz of the 1950s, jazz continued to serve as a reflection of societal changes. During the turbulent 1960s, freedom and unrest were expressed through Free Jazz and the Avant Garde. Popular and world music have been incorporated and continue to expand the impact and reach of jazz. Today, jazz is truly an international art form. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Jazz contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 1,500 cross-referenced entries on musicians, styles of jazz, instruments, recording labels, bands and bandleaders, and more. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Jazz.

Continuing the rich tradition, this latest Annual is particularly impressive. The articles in this volume present important technical analyses of four major figures: Booker Little, Charlie Christian, Herbie Hancock, and Miles Davis.