Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
A celebrated jazz writer offers fascinating portraits of friends he's known during a lifetime in jazz
For more than half a century, jazz writer and lyricist Gene Lees has been the friend of many in the world of jazz music. In this delightful book he offers minibiographies of fifteen of these friends--some of them jazz greats, some lesser-known figures, and some up-and-comers. Combining conversations and memoirs with critical commentary, Lees's insightful and intimate profiles will captivate jazz fans, performers, and historians alike. The subjects of the book range from the versatile orchestrator and arranger Claus Ogerman to legendary jazz broadcaster Willis Conover, from the gifted young Chinese violinist Yue Deng to undersung pianist Junior Mance. Lees writes about these figures both as musicians and as human beings, and he writes out of a conviction that jazz as an art form represents the highest values of American culture. Inviting us into the lives of these unique individuals, Lees offers an affectionate view of the jazz community that only an insider could provide.
Table of Contents
The journey : Milt Bernhart -- Two of a kind : Stan and Pete -- A walking sound : Ray Brown -- The man from Powell River : Don Thompson -- Remembering Dizzy : Junior Mance -- The Pittsburgh connection : Stanley Turrentine -- The good gray fox : Lou Levy -- The hug : Hugo Friedhofer -- Claus Ogerman -- The hot potato : John Bunch -- The boy in the P-38 : Allyn Ferguson -- Early autumn : Ralph Burns -- The man who won the cold war : Willis Conover -- Helen and Bill -- The adventures of Yue Deng -- The Wombat chronicle.