Jazz - A History of America's Music, the companion volume to Ken Burns's PBS documentary, has been on my bookshelves for almost two decades now. It was a very generous present from Peter and Iris on my fiftieth birthday, chosen, I'm guessing, because Peter had picked up on my particular enthusiasm for the work of Wynton Marsalis and the great trumpeter had his name all over the documentary.
For some reason I didn't see any real need to read the handsome volume all the way through initially. It seemed more like the kind of coffee table book that was worth browsing occasionally for the wonderful pictures, and dipping into now and then for specific bits - looking up what it had to say about classic albums, for example.
Gosh, was I wrong about that. Fortunately I elected to give the book the cover-to-cover treatment a couple of months back and discovered that whilst its engaging anecdotes made for enjoyable reading as individual 'bits', its main writer, Geoffrey C. Ward, had captured in the sweep of the narrative a deeply engaging and insightful history not just of jazz as a genre, but of the US itself, especially, though by no means exclusively, the experience of black Americans in the face of grim oppression.
Of necessity there are some deeply sad sections of the text. Many of the stories about Charlie Parker, to take but one example, are perplexing and almost heart-breaking. But the sense of often astounding creativity is ultimately life-enhancing. Ken Burns identifies Louis Armstrong as the central figure in all this, and it's easy to see his point, but Duke Ellington, already something of a musical hero in my eyes prior to reading the tome, emerged as the most heroic of all in his unmatched elegance and humour in the face of all that life could throw at him. And being a genius in his field helped.
I'm now seriously thinking of getting hold of the authors' book on the Civil War. If it's half as good as this one it will be something special.
