As a jazz musician whose talents only take him so far, and
as readers of this blog will know, I’m constantly reading and thinking about
jazz to help my musicianship along. Last year I read Ted GIoia’s The History of
Jazz and while I was more than impressed by his look into the history of
America’s music, I was particularly taken by the extensive discography to which
he made continual reference. After all, if you are going to understand music,
even if it is only from a historical perspective, sooner or later you are going
to have to listen to it for yourself.
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| Read for yourself, then listen (or play) for yourself. |
That’s what makes this book, Mr. Gioia’s latest work (I
think), one of his best to date: it’s extensive discography. And because this
is all about a solid core of jazz standards, the information is something that
any jazz musician will be able to use at some point. Every song has between
five and ten recordings listed for listening and research into the nuances and
hidden meanings of the songs, not to mention alternative interpretations and
styles. It not only reads like a jazz musician’s hall of fame, it reads like a
biological listing of family, genus, and species of the recordings for
understanding the very evolution of the song. Even better, the book is indexed
by song, composer and performer, so however you decide to come at a song, the
author has provided you the resources you need to choose your own angle of
approach.
After finishing this book, something that occurred to me is
that I should have been taking some notes. At some point, I sort of noticed
that the index would help me cross reference recordings and performers, but I
really should have been making a list of stuff to look for and recordings to
Google or buy. Now, if I’m going to get serious about a song or recording, I’m
going to have to go back and research it. There are worse things, I suppose,
but I could have used my time more efficiently.
I guess I’ll just have to read this book again, and I guess
that will happen sooner, rather than making me even later to jazz.
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