{"product_id":"american-musicians-ii-seventyone-portraits-in-jazz-9781578068340","title":"American Musicians II: Seventy-one Portraits in Jazz","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis is Whitney Ballietts long-awaited big book. In it are all the jazz profiles he wrote for the New Yorker during the past twenty-four years. These include his famous early portraits of Pee Wee Russell  Red Allen  Earl Hines  and Mary Lou Williams  done when these giants were in full flower; his recent reconstructions of the lives of such legends as Art Tatum  Coleman Hawkins  Jack Teagarden  Zoot Sims  and Dave Tough; His quick but indelible glimpses into the daily (or nocturnal) lives of Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus; and his vivid pictures of such on-the-scene masters as Red Norvo  Ornette Coleman  Buddy Rich  Elvin Jones  Art Farmer  Michael Moore  and Tommy Flanagan. Also included are such lesser-known but invaluable players as Art Hodes  Jabbo Smith  Joe Wilder  Warne Marsh  Gene Bertoncini  Joe Bushkin  and Marie Marcus.  All these profiles make the reader feel  as one observer has pointed out  that he is sitting with Balliett and his subject and listening in. The book can be taken as a kind of history of jazz  as well as a biographical encyclopedia of many of its most important performers. It can also be regarded as a model of American prose. Robert Dawidoff said of Whitney Ballietts most recent book  Jelly Roll  Jabbo and Fats  that few people write as well about anything as Balliett writes about jazz. And the late Philip Larkin wrote in 1982 of the transcendence of Ballietts prose.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45665862418485,"sku":"ByrdShop_1578068347","price":44.7,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9781578068340.jpg?v=1782410962","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/american-musicians-ii-seventyone-portraits-in-jazz-9781578068340","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}