David Sager, USA.
I have now read all of "Jazz Puzzles", and what a great book it is, taking literature on early jazz into a whole new area (while including some well-known sources at the same time). I can't wait for Volume 2!
Mal Collins, G.B.
Ooohhhh...I can't wait. The poster looks awesome. And I noticed that John P.
Robichaux was Chapter number 1, The Kickoff if you will. I really appreciate what
you've done for my family. You not only have told a story of him that needed to be
told, but also have showed the influence on the genre as a whole. For those that may
never have heard of JP, now they will. And so the legacy continues...
Donnie Jones,
Texas
Just wanted to congratulate you on a FANTASTIC book. Very very well done.
I note it is Volume 1 - does that mean there will be another
volume?
Colin Bray, Toronto
I have been able to browse through Jazz Puzzles more thoroughly and once again
I send my congratulations on a superb effort. My own opinions (and they are of a man
who idolises the Chicago and New York happenings as much as those in N.O) are that I
wouldn't be without it. I am delighted and excited by the rest of the book. With so
many illustrations - and so well reproduced - it really is a marvellous coffee-table
volume to pick up and browse through. And, of course, there is more historical and
musical detail of the originators than we have ever known before. As a journalist
and newspaper page designer, I think your concept for the layout of the book is
tremendous; it is a major part of its charm - and your printer has done a marvellous
job. Although ignoring some of the time-honoured methods used in bookbinding
such as spine-stitching ("progress" is bound by economics), his production is
first-class by today's standards, and it is printed on a real quality paper that
ensures even if we have seen a photograph before, we have never seen it so
clearly reproduced. I feel confident that any jazz fan picking up a copy and
leafing through it, would want to own it.
Clarence Henley
Steve Steinberg, New Orleans
Thanks for all you do with such passion for this music that helps us to live, and which memory cannot die. Your books are genuine gold mines.
Olivier Douville, Paris I started to read your book. I am litteraly flabergasted! So much work, talent and pugnacity to reach such a magnificent achievement can only inspire admiration! Thanks and again bravo!
Jean-Claude Maillard, Paris
Gabriel Rabaron, Rouen, France The book arrived safely before Christmas. Magnificent!!!!!! A great piece of work. I’m a research historian too and I work in the field of Irish traditional music, so I know what is involved. My other great interest is the music of New Orleans. So your work is greatly appreciated.
best wishes Reg Hall, Croydon, G.B.
Nils Gunnar Anderby, Sverige
Dan Vernhette’s musical predilections and the fact that he plays the trumpet mean that all his subjects are associated with New Orleans and the majority play his instrument but his first is a violinist, the great early bandleader John Robichaux and the research takes us back into the complex genealogy of Creole society, showing how he came to be the man and musician he was and throwing light on the musicians he employed and his peers. The same can be said of the treatment of Buddy Bolden, which summarises and amplifies Don Marquis’s comprehensive biographical work; also of the influential but shadowy Manuel Perez who comes to life on these pages as never before and so does Ernest Coycault who spent most of his career on the West Coast. King Oliver has of course been well documented already but even here many details of his early life are added to what we know from Laurie Wright and his predecessors.
Freddie Keppard is followed through his time with the Original Creole Band to his triumph and decline in Chicago and the ‘lost’ men of the middle period when many of their colleagues had migrated to the north, Chris Kelly, Buddy Petit and Kid Rena, are documented as never before; so are the even more obscure Arnold Metoyer who was a noted circus performer and the ill-fated Evan Thomas who employed Bunk Johnson and George Lewis in his band which worked over towards the Texas border. Punch Miller is, of course, much better known but even there some significant insights are provided.
Reed players are represented by Lorenzo Tio Jr., luminary of the Armand J. Piron orchestra but better known as an influential teacher of the clarinet in the Creole manner, and Sidney Bechet in whose case much has been added to previous well-known writings including his own; but the book is far more than a series of separate biographies. All the sections interact with each other and taken as a whole represent a most comprehensive history of early New Orleans music both at home and elsewhere. Value judgements largely come from the mouths of contemporaries, which put together give a fascinating insight into the relative merits and peculiarities of these individuals and their peers.
It is the sheer weight of research and scholarship which make this volume so impressive and so is the immense amount of work which obviously went into it. In the course of preparing this review time has not allowed the reading of every word of it but even a relatively brief browse has revealed much to fascinate and delight. It is beautifully produced in the same format as ‘Traveling Blues’ and is elegantly illustrated in black and white and colour including maps and relevant scenes as well as dozens of photos, by no means all familiar to me. There is a preface by Bruce Boyd Raeburn, Curator of the Hogan Jazz Archive, Tulane University, New Orleans.
I am proud to have been able to help in this production in a small way and the acknowledgements include many distinguished names who have provided a wealth of documentation; but it is the authors themselves who deserve the credit for fitting it all together in such a coherent way - and there is another volume to come!
Needless to say, this is an absolute priority purchase for all readers of VJM. CHRIS HILLMAN
Frank Büchmann-Møller, Danmark