George Gershwin: A New Biography [Hardcover] Review

I ordered this book because I've always liked Gershwin's music & happened to catch the last part of the film Rhapsody in Blue on Turner Movie Classics recently. The book does an adequate job of covering Gershwin's composing career, and indeed most of the chapters are titled according to the major composition discussed. If one is looking for in-depth information about Gershwin himself, his relationships, his family & his interests & activities outside music, the book is less satisfying. For example, one might assume from reading this book that his younger brother Arthur died in infancy as he is not mentioned except for his birthdate. Arthur actually lived to an old age, married, had kids & composed music himself. What relationship he & George had is unknown. Similarly, while Ira's wife Leonore had a part in George's life, she appears haphazardly throughout the book and little about her relationship with George is explored. George was also a painter but that is only tangentially mentioned. There is so much more that could fill out a broader, more in-depth picture of Gershwin. One could also wish for better editing to remove grammar errors & smooth out the repetitious use of some phrases as well as the jerky transitions from one subject to the next. The author's extensive research is evident & the endnotes at each chapter useful. For someone interested in Gershwin's growth as a composer, the book does a creditable job of documenting the major compositions & music events in the composer's life. For more about the man himself, readers must look elsewhere.

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Music in the USA: A Documentary Companion [Hardcover] Review

"Music in the USA" is essential for the student, professor, or enthusiast. Never before has such an array of primary source documents been collected into a single volume. Easy to browse, "Music in the USA" makes for a fantastic research tool as well as a great read for pure enjoyment- one can easily read up on any segment of American musical culture throughout our history. As a student, I highly recommend picking up this book. I have used it many times in my studies, and will surely reference it in my continuing pursuit into the music industry.

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Product Description:
Music in the USA: A Documentary Companion charts a path through American music and musical life using as guides the words of composers, performers, writers and the rest of us ordinary folks who sing, dance, and listen. The anthology of primary sources contains about 160 selections from 1540 to 2000. Sometimes the sources are classics in the literature around American music, for example, the Preface to the Bay Psalm Book, excerpts from Slave Songs of the United States, and Charles Ives extolling Emerson. But many other selections offer uncommon sources, including a satirical story about a Yankee music teacher; various columns from 19th-century German American newspapers; the memoirs of a 19th-century diva; Lottie Joplin remembering her husband Scott; a little-known reflection of Copland about Stravinsky;an interview with Muddy Waters from the Chicago Defender; a letter from Woody Guthrie on the "spunkfire" attitude of a folk song; a press release from the Country Music Association;and the Congressional testimony around "Napster.""Sidebar" entries occasionally bring a topic or an idea into the present, acknowledging the extent to which revivals of many kinds of music play a role in American contemporary culture. This book focuses on the connections between theory and practice to enrich our understanding of the diversity of American musical experiences.Designed especially to accompany college courses which survey American music as a whole, the book is also relevant to courses in American history and American Studies.

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Art of the Shuffle (Guitar Educational) [Paperback] Review

The Art of Shuffle by Dave Rubins is the best book on the subject I have ever come across and is a sheer delight for teachers and students alike.It realistically defines an area of study and then simply and clearlydelivers all that the printed page can.Where the printed page falls off,the information is then supported by a CD that is divided into individualtracks foreasy-find student repetition.At first the student will usethese tracks to understand what is being rhythmically and musically saidthen, later on, it is just good jam tracks to enjoy and keep your memoryand chops together.I particularly appreciate the divided tracks (thisshould be an industry standard) so you can skip over the tuning section orany part you're not focussing on instead of having to listen to the wholeCD in order to get to a specific section.I give this effort eleven stars( a perfect ten...plus) and I sincerely hope this author will do it again;I'd love to have one on turnarounds and as many other aspect of the bluesas any series could ever hold. This author makes the art of shuffle simplyirresitable.

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Product Description:
Art Of The Shuffle This method book explores shuffle, boogie and swing rhythms for guitar. Includes tab and notation, and covers Delta, country, Chicago, Kansas City, Texas, New Orleans, West Coast, and bebop blues. Also includes audio for demonstration of each style and to jam along with.

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George Gershwin: His Life and Work [Hardcover] Review

Gershwin buffs, run, don't walk to get this book. Pollack has written the definitive study of both "The Life" and "The Work," as per his two fat sections.

Pollack's book is, for one, the first Gershwin bio that takes advantage of the discovery of mountains of original orchestra parts for Golden Age musical theatre scores in a Secaucus warehouse in the early eighties. As such, Pollack analyzes Gershwin's theatre scores closely just as classical music scholars can attend to Mozart or Haydn's works.

Earlier bios could only address the scores largely on the basis of the songs from each score that happened to be published as sheet music, with only a handful of the scores then existing as full piano-vocal scores or as latter-day abridged and heavily adapted recordings. But over the past two decades, most of Gershwin's significant scores have been recorded in full from the discovered materials, such that via these recordings as well as examining the original materials himself, Pollack can address the work as it was presented when it was new, i.e. chorus numbers, character songs not published as sheets, incidental music, etc. Given that musicals constituted the bulk of Gershwin's output in his short life, this alone makes Pollack's book invaluable.

In addition, some Gershwin bios have been written by people focused on pulling him down, devoted to revealing him as an undereducated, boorish parvenu (i.e. the ones by Charles Schwartz and Joan Peyser). Pollack's sleuthing and interviews conclusively demonstrate that these evaluations were incorrect: Gershwin pursued serious musical training throughout his life, it shows in his work, and socially, he was a beloved, charming person who was deeply mourned at his death.

Pollack has truly done his homework, such that just about any question one might have about Gershwin is exhaustively answered. For each show he chronicles not only the score and its critical reception in New York, but also its London and even Australian versions if there were any, all of the revivals across the US, and its recordings -- and he does this even starting with the obscure early efforts. He is equally thorough re Gershwin's concert music.

It should be said that those seeking further engagement with the raison d'etre of Joan Peyser's THE MEMORY OF ALL THAT, the story that Gershwin fathered a love child with a chorus girl and paid him and his mother off to keep it quiet, will not be satisfied. Pollack briefly addresses objections to that thesis from some quarters since Peyser's book was published -- but, in my view, neglects the rather damning facts that 1) said love child looks exactly like Gershwin and 2)was supported in his claim to have made regular visits to Gershwin's apartment by none other than Gershwin's valet. As such, one must consult various sources pre- and post-Peyser to come to conclusions about that issue. One suspects that Pollack, having been granted interviews from surviving keepers of the Gershwin flame, opted on that particular subject to step around giving offense. He is not to be faulted for this.

It should also be said, however, that inevitably of a work so dazzlingly complete, this book is not one most people would want to read from front to back. It is, in its way, a reference book set in prose. There are times when Pollack seems almost obsessive -- such as bringing vast study to bear upon locating the purchase by Gershwin's parents of a piano in precisely late 1910, or letting us know (based on a chance message from abroad) that OH, KAY played in translation in Sweden, or informing us via close examination of the original arrangement of RHAPSODY IN BLUE -- not later arrangements, but the original one, mind you -- that one player doubled on bass and tuba.

But this degree of obsession is what real scholarship is, and though for most it will be a book to jump around in than to read page for page, Pollack has given us an authoritative masterpiece. I am in awe of the man, and happy to have this one on my shelves forever.

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Stardust Melodies [Hardcover] Review

Did you know that Evelyn Walsh McLean, owner of the Hope Diamond and a backer of the production of 'Show Boat', was so aghast when its creators wanted to take 'Ol' Man River' out of the show during out-of-town tryouts that she bet them the Diamond that it would be the hit of the show? She didn't have to give up her gem, and this gem of a song was saved. Did you know that Stan Freberg recorded his own politically correct version of the song, retitling it 'Elderly Man River'? Or did you know that Herman Hupfeld, the writer of both the words and music for 'As Time Goes By' had only one other hit in his long career, and that was 'When Yuba Plays the Rhumba on the Tuba'?
This book is not just a collection of trivia about twelve popular American songs, but it is filled with such oddball facts as these. Will Friedwald starts each chapter with the story of how the song came to be writen, gives a neat analysis of the technical details of the song, and then describes the major recorded versions of each song. This is indeed a treasure trove of information about these songs, and if nothing else, reminds us of the long and rich history of American popular song.
The twelve songs, each with its own chapter, are, in chronological order, 'Star Dust', 'The St. Louis Blues', 'Mack the Knife', 'Ol' Man River', 'Body and Soul', 'I Got Rhythm', 'As Time Goes By', 'Night and Day', 'Stormy Weather', 'Summertime', 'My Funny Valentine', and 'Lush Life.'

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Deep Blues: A Musical and Cultural History of the Mississippi Delta [Paperback] Review

Palmer's love of the blues shines through in this exceptional book. He's not interested in showing off his knowledge of the form (although that knowledge is exceptional); he's interested in illuminating for the readerthe roots of a great indigenous art form and how that form developed in the20th century. In that effort, he succeeds masterfully.
A fine earlysection explores how the music that we call the blues was seeded in N.America by African music. That chapter is a mini-history lesson in itself;Palmer shows how the music of slaves from W. Africa was viewed assubversive and dangerous by whites in the new land.
The remainder of thebook is chock full of portraits of the heroes of early blues in theMississippi Delta, from Charley Patton to Son House to Robert Johnson toLittle Walter to Muddy Waters and beyond. Palmer shows how these mendeveloped a music that grew directly out of the soil of the Delta, makingdo with the instruments they had and often living itinerant lives, movingfrom tiny town to tiny town to play dances and juke joints to keep themusic alive.
The book also describes the historic migration ofAfrican-Americans from the Deep South to the industrial cities of theNorth, most importantly, of course, Chicago, where the musicianstransformed the blues again, creating the electrified sounds that exertedsuch a powerful influence on white rock musicians from London to Liverpoolto La Jolla, California.
Palmer has given us a great work with "DeepBlues," one that should be read by students of music and socialhistory alike. It deserves a prominent place on the bookshelf of anyserious lover of music.

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Three Chords for Beauty's Sake: The Life of Artie Shaw [Hardcover] Review

In 1985, in what I now view as a life event, my wife and I saw Artie Shaw perform at the Blue Note in New York. I passed the 75 year-old jazz star in the hallway, and I was about to approach him, but his manner said stay away. It wasn't personal. Shaw disliked fans; in fact, he said, "Keep `em all away from me," that very night. So I never talked to Artie Shaw. Still, I felt I knew him, having read his memoir, "The Trouble With Cinderella," several times. And now I know him even better, thanks to "Three Chords for Beauty's Sake,The Life of Artie Shaw," an excellent new book by Tom Nolan. It's the tale of how Arthur Arshawsky, a Jewish kid from the Lower East Side, became a popular band leader and great jazz clarinetist almost by force of will. Nolan has all: The childhood anti-Semitism; the long musical apprenticeship; the breakthrough to stardom in 1938 with "Begin the Beguine;" Shaw's walkout from the music business a year later; his return with the mega-hit, "Frenesi;" his breaking of the color line by hiring Billie Holiday, Roy Eldridge and Hot Lips Page; the exquisite tone he drew from the clarinet. The women are here (Lana Turner, Ava Gardner, Betty Grable, Lena Horne), and the war (fighting men cried when Navy Chief Shaw and his Rangers played in jungle outposts or on the decks of aircraft carriers). Here, too, are Shaw's postwar depression, his emergence with a new band, his appearance before the House Un-American Activities Committee and his struggle to write. The book is well-documented, for Shaw lived until 2004 and was always ready to talk about himself to journalists. And it's well-written. But there are two vast holes at the center of it, neither of them Nolan's fault. For one, we never find out why Shaw gave up the clarinet in 1954 after doing some of his best work with a small jazz combo. (He didn't play the night I saw him--he conducted, and shared memories in his gruff way). Shaw's own answers are unsatisfying. And how is it that a flawed human being like Shaw, who rejected his sons and was cruel to his wives, could produce some of the most romantic and lyrical recordings ever made, like "Star Dust," "Dancing in the Dark," "Alone Together" and "Summertime?" I've accepted the fact that I know very little about Artie Shaw.

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