The History of Jazz – Ted Gioia

“As our murderous century draws to an end, surveys of its various arts are inevitable, and as a forerunner, Ted Gioia’s concise history is a fine achievement, its main text occupying only 400 pages-not too many to daunt the internerds! The book is in two equal parts, the second beginning with ‘Modern Jazz and The Birth of Bebop.’ Of the first, I can say that it is even-handed and gives a good picture of the peaks in what many still consider the greatest period of jazz. Some of the heroes, victims of compression or Gioia’s personal taste, are omitted or treated too briefly, such as Jimmy Harrison, J.C. Higginbotham, Trummy Young, Eddie South, Hilton Jefferson, Sidney DeParis and one heroine, Helen Humes. Otherwise, judgments and appraisals are well considered and enlightening. The second part, with which I have less sympathy, continues the story chronologically, describing each ‘innovation’ carefully but not always critically. What is perhaps insufficiently stressed here is that major names of the preceding era, like Armstrong, Ellington, Hines, Goodman and Basie, lived on into the ’70s and ’80s alongside Carter and Hampton, their legends lending luster to the world’s conception of jazz. When the primos of bebop-Parker, Gillespie, Monk, Mingus and Clarke-followed them from this vale of tears, there was a sudden falling off, a kind of void made by the paucity of significant figures commanding international respect. The malaise this caused is a primary motif in the other two books. …”
Jazz Times
[PDF] The History of Jazz
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