A collection of quotes and anecdotes loosely organized around eleven influential personalities (Ellington, Holiday, Armstrong, Wilson, Mulligan, Davis, Mingus, Parker, Coltrane, Taylor, and Barbieri), some recent developments, and "the political economy of jazz"—a chapter title as misleading as the book's. Aficionados will find many famous vignettes along with a few previously unrecorded ones and corrections of misrecorded ones. But after more than thirty years writing everything from liner notes to novels about jazz, Hentoff's awed fan stance gets him no closer to a definition of it than his previous efforts. Now a Village Voice columnist on politics and civil liberties, his take on racial and cultural factors lacks the passion and scholarship of LeRoi Jones' Blues People and Black Music; his biographical data the depth of A. B. Spellman's Black Music: Four Lives; and his criticism the precision of Whitney Balliett's Ecstasy at the Onion or Martin Williams' fine The Jazz Tradition. Hentoff borrows from some of these and various biographies and autobiographies, making Jazz Is almost a sampler, worthwhile more as introduction than source book. Since there is no writer who has brought it all together for jazz the way, say, Edwin Denby has for dance, young readers and newcomers might use this book as a catalogue from which future reading and listening can be chosen.
Pub Date: Sept. 28, 1976
ISBN: 0879100036
Page Count: 372
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1976
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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