n OF course, there are those who would make an argument for the movies, but persons of quality and discernment will admit the claim of jazz to be the quintessential art form of the twentieth century. Gary Giddins (Visions of Jazz, The First Century, Oxford University Press, #25) sets the context with his title, but this hefty history is no glib run through the familiar story from the Original Dixieland Jazz Band to Wynton Marsalis. In what is a truly remarkable work, Giddins, jazz writer for Village Voice for a quarter of that century, combines inclusiveness with academic rigour and idiosyncratic personal preference with authoritative critical opinion.
Giddins sets out his territory clearly in the introduction. He'll have no truck with those whose ears do not choose to encompass the broadest spectrum of music. He ackowledges the contribution of composer George Russell in putting form to one of the crucial leaps forward in jazz, and then lists him among the important figures omitted from book (alongside anyone not from the US). You will,
however, find chapters on figures from the ''precursors'' through to successive innovators Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, and on to Don Pullen, Joe Henderson, Geri Allen, and winding up with the eclectic, wonderful, and notoriously difficult Don Byron. There is no
contrariness in the selection, just taste and the limitations of a single volume.
Don't be put off by the pages of transcription that appear in the midst of the bebop section, they serve only as illustrations and Giddins is never less than readable. An incredibly valuable addition to any jazz-lovers library.
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