Displaying 1 of 1 1997 Format: Book Author: Piazza, Tom, 1955- Title: Blues up and down : jazz in our time / Tom Piazza. Publisher, Date: New York : St. Martin's Press, [1997] ©1997 Description: x, 194 pages ; 22 cm Subjects: Jazz -- 1991-2000 -- History and criticism. Notes: 002886 ; *012575 LCCN: 97021944 ISBN: 031216789X System Availability: 2 # System items in: 2 # Local items: 2 # Local items in: 2 Current Holds: 0 Place Request Add to My List Expand All | Collapse All Availability Large Cover Image Trade Reviews Library Journal ReviewAccording to some critics, jazz today is in a renaissance. Yet others take the view that jazz is dead, that today's young players are trapped in the past. These two books are on opposite sides of this raging debate. Relating the history of jazz to social forces, Nisenson (Ascension: Coltrane and His Quest, LJ 12/93) concludes that jazz is no longer created in its own time but is instead a dead art form. As a result, he attacks those he refers to as the "neo-classicists": Stanley Crouch, Albert Murray, Wynton Marsalis, and Piazza himself. In his collection of previously published pieces, Piazza (The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz, LJ 3/1/95) takes the opposite tack, arguing that the concept of "jazz as emotion" is a fallacy and that jazz has regained what it had been missing in the years of jazz-rock fusion: technique, a feeling of swing, and knowledge of and respect for the tradition. (Sadly, another issue raised in both books is racism; there have been accusations that the Jazz at Lincoln Center program, under the auspices of Marsalis, has excluded white musicians.) The truth likely lies somewhere between the two poles presented here, and these two books are recommended jointly for effectively providing both sides of the argument.Michael Colby, Univ. of California, Davis (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.Publishers Weekly ReviewIn the essays, articles and reviews collected here, critic Piazza (Blues and Trouble) looks at the state of jazz in the 1980s and 1990s. He examines the work of a few individual musicianse.g., Mary Lou Williams, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powelland discusses independent record companies, the Smithsonian Folkways legacy and a jazz festival sponsored by Club Med in Senegal. The essence of the book, however, is in Piazza's articles castigating critics who perpetuate the notion that jazz is about emotion, not art, and who revile jazz musicians engaged in exploring the jazz tradition with the intelligence and seriousness that characterizes artists in other spheres. He accuses these reviewers of not knowing enough about music to understand what jazz is, claiming they are on the defensive and can fight back only by disparaging trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, whose confrontational attitude, he contends, has brought their inadequacies into the open, and young musicians who consider jazz an art form. Some of these thought-provoking but highly opinionated pieces have been published earlier in various periodicals. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reservedBooklist ReviewControversy has raged during the past few years between jazz neoclassicists, who have a fixed definition of jazz tradition, and critics and musicians who feel that that definition is too constricting. Neoclassicist Piazza celebrates trumpeter Wynton Marsalis for his own music and the Lincoln Center concerts he presents with writer Stanley Crouch. Piazza argues that Marsalis is an accomplished and dedicated musician, that Crouch's confrontational stance is more than just a pose, and that their commitment has sparked the careers of a plethora of new talent. Besides his comments on today's jazz scene, Piazza says significant new things about such legends as Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, and Art Tatum, as well as the great folk music recording label, Smithsonian Folkways. Whether or not readers agree with Piazza's stance in the recent debate, his musical knowledge is impeccable. Nisenson vehemently opposes Piazza's view. According to Nisenson, the conservative ideas about the jazz of Marsalis, his followers, and the music industry are destroying creativity in the music. Nisenson also charges that the neoclassicist view of jazz history is distorted because it has excluded the contributions of many important white performers, such as Bix Beiderbecke and Lee Konitz. Nisenson provides a precis of his take on the tradition and describes how innovative movements have arisen. As the author of Ascension: John Coltrane and His Quest (1993), Nisenson has a particular affinity for the 1960s, but he makes important comments on earlier musicians, notably Jimmy Giuffre and Charlie Parker. Nisenson does not display Piazza's erudition, but his passion is engrossing. Getting Piazza and Nisenson together would make for a heck of a book tour. --Aaron CohenKirkus ReviewPiazza, whose short-story collection Blues and Trouble (1996) won the Michener Prize, looks again at his favorite music in this collection of occasional pieces. Writing on jazz between 1979 and 1997 (for which he won the 1996 ASCAPDeems Taylor Award for Music Writing), Piazza has had the opportunity to watch this musical phoenix arise once again resplendent from its supposed ashes. In the course of the two decades covered by the pieces in this volume (most of them previously published in the New York Times, the New Republic, Atlantic Monthly, and the Village Voice), Piazza has recounted the arrival of a new generation of young jazz musicians, headed by the controversial Wynton Marsalis. The author has been one of the more forceful advocates for Marsalis and his acolytes and their brand of neoclassical jazz. Briefly, Piazza believes that the critics who decry Marsalis's lack of ``emotion'' are unwittingly and tacitly racist, reducing all jazz to a sort of primitive expression of raw feeling and undervaluing the role of intellect in the creation of the music. It's an argument that's not without some merit, as his lengthy attacks on James Lincoln Collier (particularly a scathing review of Collier's egregious Duke Ellington biography) show. But too many of the pieces here--the opening reviews of McCoy Tyner and Mary Lou Williams in particular--have little or nothing to do with this thesis. The best essays are reportage from the road, a previously unpublished piece on a jazz festival in Dahomey and a recounting of days and nights on tour with Wynton and his band. Piazza is a writer worth paying attention to, but this book is too slight a framework to support his arguments. In fact, it is too slight a framework to call a book. Summary Ever since the birth of jazz, critics have been sounding its death knell. Yet each time the music has survived, saved by its own core values of inclusion and community, and by the brilliance of its players. Tom Piazza, award-winning music journalist offers a chronicle of the recent upheavals in the jazz world, and a passionate argument for the music's continuing role in our culture. Blues Up and Down combines Piazza's influential reportage from The New York Times, The New Republic, and elsewhere, with a series of bold and broad new essays; together they form a sharp indictment of the schools of criticism that nearly strangled jazz -- and an insightful exploration of the traditions that propel the music onward. Table of Contents Acknowledgmentsp. viiIntroductionp. ixPart 1Chapter 1.p. 3McCoy Tyner's Present Tensep. 9Mary Lou Williams Keeps the Faithp. 12The Stick Carriersp. 15Part 2Chapter 2.p. 47Black and Tan Fantasyp. 50Sing, Sing, Singp. 61Chapter 3.p. 65Portrait of Wynton Marsalisp. 81Chapter 4.p. 96Young, Gifted, and Coolp. 101Keepers of the Flamep. 115Chapter 5.p. 122The Little Record Labels That Couldp. 124The Smithsonian/Folkways Legacyp. 129The Adam, Eve, and Maybelle of Countryp. 136A Creation Myth, or Jelly's Last Laughp. 140How Two Pianists Remade a Traditionp. 144Jazz Piano's Heavyweight Champp. 150Chapter 6.p. 156The Shock of the Oldp. 159Lincoln Center and Its Critics Swing Awayp. 166Part 3Chapter 7Blues Up and Downp. 173 Librarian's View Syndetics Unbound Displaying 1 of 1
