Jazz on Record, The First Sixty Years

Scott Yanow

Jazz on Record, The First Sixty Years

Back Beat Books ISBN: 0-87930-755-2

Based on Scott Yanow's enormous contribution to the print world of Jazz, including the various columns and CD reviews he did over the years for our publication, Jazz Now, he has to be considered one of the foremost authorities on the subject of our favorite art form, Jazz.

Back Beat Book has now published another wonderful reference book by Scott, Jazz On Record The First Sixty Years. The cover art of the 858 page hard cover edition is a very colorful Art Deco graphic. The contents are separated by intervals from 1895 to 1976 and make up 10 chapters.

Chapter one tackles the age old question "What exactly is Jazz?" "When did it start?" You have to smile at one answer, a quote from one of the masters, "If you don't know what it is, don't mess with it." This chapter also speaks to: "1895 - 1920: The Lost Beginnings," "Jazz First Star," and "The Start of the Record Industry." It also give a very interesting "Timeline 1895 - 1920." I consider this one of the most important part of the book. Since our magazine Jazz Now published an article "San Francisco First, Then New Orleans?," in the February 1997 print edition by the historian John William Templeton where he revealed that the first time the word Jazz appeared in print was in the San Francisco Bulletin newspaper of March 6, 1913 referring to Art Hickman's band playing at a San Francisco Seals game. In this book there is also an account of "The Start of the Record Industry, " a "Timeline 1895 - 1920," important Jazz milestones.

Jazz on Record The First Sixty Years, in all of its chapters, takes you through every step of the evolution of Jazz. If you just arrived here from another planet and was privilege enough to have this book, the history of this world, and the listed Jazz recordings, you could possibly understand this art form called Jazz.

Other Scott Yanow books that we use as reference are: All Music Guide to Jazz, 3rd Edition, Bebop Great Muicians - Influential Groups, 1600 Recordings Reviewed & Rated

by Haybert K. Houston, Publisher-Editor-in-Chief