Anyone know anything about this Coltrane book?

[jpmosu]

While its true that not all books are for all readers, that's not how they get organized in the book store:  Pretentious Crap for Non-Jazz Lovers; Non-Technical Biography For Jazz Fans Without Music Degrees; Heavy Technical Analysis ...

I'm not sure what this has to do with the audience that Gabbard is writing for. If Barnes and Noble lumps all Jazz titles together in the same section, then a quick glance at the table of contents should reveal whether or not it's a book that might serve your reading interests. And, after all, it's a collection that's published by Duke University Press, which itself suggests something about the potential audience.

Perhaps "pretentious" is a poor choice of words, but I know I'd be damn disappointed if I found myself spending money for a book that had no serious interest in jazz or the musicians who make it and just use jazz to hang some currently "hip" academic theory off of.

No serious interest in jazz? If you haven't read the collection, this is a foolish statement to make. The contributers not only have an interest in the music, but they also want to present it as a serious art form: one worth listening to, but also one worth thinking about and teaching in a university setting. Most of us love jazz and probably can't imagine how anyone couldn't take it seriously, intellectually speaking. But as someone who teaches film, I understand that some disciplines are deemed unimportant within the academy (at least for a time). Now, if you have read the collection and feel it has "no serious interest in jazz," then so be it. But I have a feeling that someone who dismisses "hip academic theory" (as if this is some monolithic "thing") probably didn't make it past the introduction.

Edited March 18, 2005 by jpmosu

[Dan Gould]

My comments were based entirely on bluesforbartok's comments as an example of a particular kind of jazz book and on your reply. I made no implication that I had read the specific book in question (note that I said, "I'd be damn disappointed if I found myself spending money for a book that had no serious interest in jazz." I'm sure you recognize that tense as future conditional.)

On the other hand, I am pretty confident that there are many books that get published which use jazz in a superficial way to flog some current academic theory or to approach it from some tangential field, and it is not at all clear that those writers love jazz or even know jack shit about it.

Edited March 18, 2005 by Dan Gould

[jpmosu]

My comments were based entirely on bluesforbartok's comments as an example of a particular kind of jazz book and on your reply.  I made no implication that I had read the specific book in question (note that I said, "I'd be damn disappointed if I found myself spending money for a book that had no serious interest in jazz."  I'm sure you recognize that tense as future conditional.)

On the other hand, I am pretty confident that there are many books that get published which use jazz in a superficial way to flog some current academic theory or to approach it from some tangential field, and it is not at all clear that those writers love jazz or even know jack shit about it.

Point taken about the verb tense issue. However, I do want to defend a book that has real merit and to counter the implication that much academic writing is the product of people dabbling in things they know nothing about. Who, in their right mind, would take the intellectual effort to write a lengthy, theoretically-informed essay about something (e.g., jazz) that they care nothing (or know nothing) about. "Tenure" pressures *might* explain the latter, but certainly not the former. Academics don't always know everything about every subject, but they're usually trying to stretch people's minds a bit (including their own). Pesonally, I find that I don't really know what I think about a lot of things until I write about it.

Hey, I realize that academic writing *can* be jargon-y and difficult and that someone brilliant people just don't write that well (there are pieces in the Gabbard book that illustrate this, btw), but generalizations are usually not wise to make, and, Gabbard, in particular has done some really interesting work (check out his book on Hollywood and jazz: *Jammin' at the Margins*).

In the end, I probably woke up crabby this morning, which may explain a bit of extra defensiveness on my part.

I do enjoy the discussion here, except when it turns kind of bitchy (and I'm as guilty as anyone today, I guess).

[ghost of miles]

There's plenty of room for cultural-studies approaches in jazz history, and to knock it is just as negligent as it is to knock the incorporation of technical analysis IMO. The music isn't made in a vacuum, and the social and economic forces that influence its making are sometimes profound indeed.

The book is cited so much that it's rather a tired example at this point, but Scott Deveaux's THE BIRTH OF BEBOP seems to capture the elusive balance that some of us seek--a blend of history, musicology, cultural analysis, and true love for the music (Deveaux plays himself). In fact, I'd say the books I've liked best in recent years were written by authors who play jazz themselves and who also have a background in modern cultural studies. They seem best-equipped to write about the music. However, I completely understand the desire of some to completely avoid that aspect of things; it's not part of why they enjoy jazz, and that's totally cool.

[Dr. Rat]

Now, as for "soiritual/emotiional" - I wish you would stop using these technical terms. I tried looking them up and couldn't find them in the Harvard Brief Dictionary, nor in the Webster's Collegiate.

I didn't know that Harvard had a dictionary of underwear!

And as for Webster's, you gotta look at Ben, not Miriam.

You laugh, but I think there is a big book on undergarments done by someone in a cultural studies department, somewhere. Not quite a bief dictionary, but getting there.

--eric

[Dr. Rat]

BTW: Interesting thread, thought provoking contributions. Sorry I can't offer a technical analysis at the moment, I'm heading for the tonic.

--eric

[dave9199]

I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition.

[JSngry]

Somebody....

Anybody...

...2...3...4...

[Michael Fitzgerald]

The larch

Mike

[AllenLowe]

don't get me started on academics - as a matter of fact, to save time, Mike can run some of my rants from the Jazz Research group - well, I'll say a bit, if everybody insists. The Grabbard book has some decent writing in it, mixed with the usual bad stuff. Nothing wrong with academia, as a matter of fact I'd take an academic position in a minute, though no one will ever me offer me any such thing. The problem, as I've said before, is that the academics make so damn many musical gaffes - last night I was reading a collection of articles on Jimi Hendrix. Prof says, Jimi played a right handed guitar strung as a lefty, even though he could easily have found a left-handed guitar, to show the world that he was working against the grain, playing against convention. CRAP! Hendrix played the best guitar he could find - quality is variable - so if he was searching for a guitar, he was going to find 100 righties for every lefty - so what are the odds on which one he would find acceptable? So here we go again - prof turns a reasonably explainable action into some kind of symbolic B.S. - hope she got tenure -

Edited March 19, 2005 by AllenLowe

[Christiern]

• I agree with Allen, there is an awful lot of idiotic assumption going on in many of these books. Remember, too, that they are often written to fulfill an academic requirement. Years ago, in the Saturday Review, I took Ben Sidran to task for this kind of sloppiness. He wrote me a pathetic letter the gist of which seemed to be that a reviewer has no right to point out factual errors--it just isn't fair!
  

[dave9199]

God forbid anyone would make someone feel responsible for their actions!

[Niko]

maybe the wrong thread to ask.. but which Coltrane biographies do you recommend? after some searching to me it looks like a decision between Lewis Porter's and Cuthbert Simpkins' books... so opinions between these two are especially appreciated, but also hints at other books...

thank you!

[JSngry]

I'd recommend both the Porter & the Simpkins, for different reasons. Porter's for the "biography", Simpkins' for the "vibe".

Other than those two, just listen to the records...