At the Jazz Band Ball: Sixty Years on the Jazz Scene

Nat Hentoff

Univ of California Press, 2010 - Music - 272 pages

“Nat Hentoff may very well be the foremost jazz historian in the world because he was there to witness firsthand the music’s evolution from big band and swing to fusion and bossa nova; and to dive into the souls of the men and women who created it from Ellington, Basie, Miles, Ray Charles, Ella Fitzgerald and Dinah Washington, among many others. At the Jazz Band Ball: Sixty Years on the Jazz Scene is an invaluable archive of not only the musical influence of America’s only indigenous music on the world, but its enormous impact as an engine for social change as well. It is a book that should be read by every young musician, music fan, and educator in America.”—Quincy Jones

"The very best witnesses in the worlds of the law, aesthetic evaluation, social contexts of imposing significance, and artistic public performance are those who accurately understand what they have seen or what they are seeing. Nat Hentoff has been and continues to be a star witness in every one of those arenas. One of the greatest contributions of his jazz writing is that he has never felt the need to condescend to black people or to let the dictates of sociology diminish the universal significance of what they do when they do it well. Nat knows that so many jazz musicians have done what they do superbly, quite often expressing themselves beyond the narrows of color. As sensitive to the Americana of jazz as he is to its transcendent revelations about the sound of the human heart, Nat Hentoff is part of our American luck."—Stanley Crouch

“At the Jazz Band Ball is full of nuggets from Nat's rich lode of wit and wisdom, gleaned in a lifetime of fellowship with jazz and its makers.”—Dan Morgenstern, Director, Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University; author of Living With Jazz: A Reader

Contents

• Introduction: 1
• Part One What Am I Here For? The Rules of My Jazz Odyssey: 7
• Who Owns Jazz? 2 My Debt to Artie Shaw 9: 9
• The Family of Jazz: 12
• Beyond the Process: 14
• Playing Changes on Jazz interviews: 16
• Part Two In the Presence of Ellington: 19
• inside the Ellington Band 21 23 24: 21
• Duke Ellingtons Posthumous Revenge: 23
• Part Three Jazz Credentials: 29
• is Jazz Black Music? 31 33: 31
• No One Else Sounded Like Pee Wee Russell: 33
• Just Call Him Thelonious: 35
• Remembering Dizzy: 40
• A Jazz Behemoth Moves On: 42
• A Great Night in Providence for Jazz and Snow: 43
• The Perfect Jazz Club: 45
• The Life of a Music Legend: 47
• The Music of the 1930s is Back in Full Swing: 49
• The Expansive Jazz Journey of Marian McPartland: 52
• Going inside Jazz with Wynton: 54
• PART FOUR THE JAZZ LIFE ON AND OFF THE ROAD: 57
• A Conversation with Clark Terry: 59
• Phil Woods: 66
• Conventional Unwisdom about Jazz: 74
• PART FIVE WHO IS A JAZZ SINGER?: 77
• Are Krall and Monheit Jazz Singers?: 79
• A Biography in Music: 80
• This Daughter of Jazz Is One Cool Cat: 83
• The Springtime of Frank Sinatra: 85
• Sinatra Sings in Vegas and You Are There: 87
• Shes on the Road to Renown: 89
• Bing and Guests Swing on the Air: 91
• PART SIX THE LIFE FORCE OF THE MUSIC: 95
• The Joyous Power of Black Gospel Music: 97
• The Healing Power of Jazz: 99
• Old Country Jewish Blues and Ornette Coleman: 101
• The Jewish Soul of Willie The Lion Smith: 103
• PART SEVEN FINDING THE FIRST AMENDMENT GROOVE: 107
• Satchmos Rap Sheet: 109
• The Constitution of a Jazzman: 111
• How Jazz Helped Hasten the Civil Rights Movement: 113
• The Congressman from the Land of Jazz: 117
• Jazz Musicians in the Public Square: 119
• Quincy JonesPast Present and Future: 121
• PART EIGHT ROOTS: 125
• King Oliver in the Grooves: 127
• Giants at Play: 129
• Barrelhouse Chuck Goering Keeps the Blues Alive: 131
• Jazzs History Is Living in Queens: 133
• The Thoreau of Jazz: 143
• in New Orleans the Saints Are Marching in Again: 150
• Bridging Generations: 157
• Born in israel: 163
• NineteenyearOld Saxophonist verifies Future of Jazz: 172
• Jon Faddis: 178
• A House of Swing for All Ages: 193
• These Little Kids Think Coltrane is Cool: 210
• Credits: 223

About the author

Nat Hentoff is an internationally known jazz critic and the only critic ever designated a Jazz Master by the NEA. He is a regular columnist for Jazz.com and the Wall Street Journal, the United Media Newspaper Syndicate, and the Cato Institute, where he is a senior fellow. His many books include Jazz Country; Jazz Is; The Jazz Life; Boston Boy: Growing Up with Jazz and Other Rebellious Passions; Living the Bill of Rights; and the forthcoming Is This America?

Bibliographic information

• Title: At the Jazz Band Ball: Sixty Years on the Jazz Scene; A Roth Family Foundation Music in America Book Series
• Author: Nat Hentoff
• Contributor: Lewis Porter
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: Univ of California Press, 2010
• ISBN: 0520269810, 9780520269811
• Length: 272 pages
• Subjects: Music / General; Music / Genres & Styles / Jazz; Music / History & Criticism; Science / Earth Sciences / Geography; Social Science / Regional Studies