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As a musician who grew up in New Orleans, and later worked in New York with the major swing orchestras of Lucky Millinder and Cab Calloway, Barker is uniquely placed to give an authoritative but personal view of jazz history. In this book he discusses his life in music, from the children's 'spasm' bands of the seventh ward of New Orleans, through the experience of brass bands and jazz funerals involving his grandfather, Isidore Barbarin, to his early days on the road with the blues singer Little Brother Montgomery. Later he goes on to discuss New York, and the jazz scene he found there in 1930. His work with Jelly Roll Morton, as well as the lesser-known bands of Fess Williams and Albert Nicholas, is covered before a full account of his years with Millinder, Benny Carter and Calloway, including a description of Dizzy Gillespie's impact on jazz, is given. The final chapters discuss Barker's career from the late 1940s. Starting with the New York dixieland scene at Ryan's and Condon's he talks of his work with Wilbur de Paris, James P. Johnson and This is Jazz, before discussing his return to New Orleans and New Orleans Jazz Museum. A collection of Barker's photographs,
The first volume of Barker's memoirs, A Life in Jazz, followed him from New Orleans into the big bands of Cab Calloway and Benny Carter. He was working on this-the second volume-for some years before his death in 1994. Beginning with an extended portrait of Buddy Bolden as recalled by the likes of Jelly Roll Morton and Bunk Johnson as well as Barker himself, this book draws together a lifetime of stories and the vivid characters who populated "Storyville."Danny Barker (1909-1994) sang and played the guitar and banjo on over 1,000 jazz, swing, blues, and bebop records. He is a member of the Jazz Hall of Fame and recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Music Master Award. Alyn Shipton is a writer and broadcaster on jazz. He is the editor of A Life in Jazz, the first volume of Danny Barker's memoirs.
When Tom Seymour, a child psychologist, plunges into the water to save a man from drowning he opens a chapter from his past. The drowning man was Danny Miller, who Tom helped imprison for killing an old woman as a ten-year-old boy.
"Floyd Levin's half-century collection of reportage, reviews and recollections are an irreplaceable and totally enjoyable trove of writing about the vibrancy, past and still-present, of traditional American jazz."—Charles Champlin, author of Back There Where the Past Was "I've known Floyd and his wife Lucille for more than fifty years. Floyd's book is a colorful, intimate account of his lifelong love affair with jazz. I'm especially fascinated when he writes about his personal encounters with some of the jazz legends of the Century. This book is essential reading for anyone concerned about jazz - its present, its past, and his evolution."—Milt Hinton "Floyd Levin's dedicated and unselfis...
Losing Faith in Faith records Dan Barker's dramatic journey from devout soul-winner to one of America's most prominent freethinkers.Following his "calling" at age 15, Dan Barker worked as a missionary, ordained minister, associate pastor, touring evangelist, Christian songwriter, performer and record producer. After preaching for 19 years, Barker "lost faith in faith." Throwing out the bath water, he discovered: "There is no baby there!"Today Barker, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Inc., (www.ffrf.org) frequently represents freethought on the talkshow circuit and at personal appearances, concerts, and debates around the country, turning his experience as a former minist...
A vivid and fascinating up-close encounter with jazz, brim-full of anecdote and personal reminiscence, by an internationally known broadcaster and writer.
The moving story of a New Orleans woman who fought for justice and her community even amidst one of the city's darkest moments. Mark Hertsgaard and Deborah Cotton were strangers to one another, united only by a love of jazz and New Orlean’s distinctive Second Line tradition. And then, during a Mother’s Day parade, they were thrown together when two gunmen fired into the crowd… Deborah Cotton—known to all as Big Red—was among the most grievously injured. She is the driving force of this deeply reported parable of two of America’s most deeply rooted issues. A racial justice activist in her forties who was born to a Black father and a white mother, Cotton was one of twenty people—...
This book is a cultural tour of the burial places of Southern musicians. It honors the men and women that formed modern American music. Detailed here are the gravesites of more than 300 blues, country and rock musicians through the South from New Orleans to Kentucky. The gravesites of well-known musicians such as Bill Monroe, Tammy Wynette, Duane Allman and Mahalia Jackson are visited, as well as the final resting places of dozens of less well known, but vitally important, American musicians. Many pictures of gravesites are included, along with specific directions to burial sites. The book is especially thorough in relation to the most important cities in Southern music--Nashville, New Orleans and Memphis. There are numerous side trips through Cajun country, blues related sites in Mississippi, old time country musicians' final resting places throughout Alabama and North Carolina, and many other places in all the states of the South.
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The richest place in America's musical landscape is that fertile ground occupied by jazz. Scott DeVeaux takes a central chapter in the history of jazz—the birth of bebop—and shows how our contemporary ideas of this uniquely American art form flow from that pivotal moment. At the same time, he provides an extraordinary view of the United States in the decades just prior to the civil rights movement. DeVeaux begins with an examination of the Swing Era, focusing particularly on the position of African American musicians. He highlights the role played by tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, a "progressive" committed to a vision in which black jazz musicians would find a place in the world comm...