New Jazz Books

Press, Volume C, Issue 29638, 7 October 1961, Page 3

New Jazz Books

The high reputation enjoyed by Penguin Books, as a publisher of intelligent literature has not, in general, been shared by the readers of the firm’s two jazz books. The first, Rex Harris’s “Jazz,” published in 1952, was 20 years out of date; the second, “Recorded Jazz: A Critical Guide,” by Rex Harris and Brian Rust, was equally out of date when published six years later. The third Penguin on the subject however (“The Jazz Scene,” Francis Newton, 282 pp. and index), should completely redeem the firm’s reputation, for it is probably the best value for money ever offered on the jazz book market.

Francis Newton is a pseudonym for an English scholar of distinction (a professor of history) who contributes a column about jazz and allied forms of entertainment to the weekly “New Statesman.” His style is terse and highly literate and much of what he says makes good sense, particularly in relation to the social and financial problems facing the player—and the listener.

In a sense, Mr Newton has written two books in one; the first seven chapters is a history of jazz, and the other seven deal with the relationship between jazz and other arts, the musicians and the public. The beginner will find the first chapters as well written a history of jazz as has been published, but the more experienced reader will find little he does not know. He will, however, find stimulating reading in the other chapters, particularly those dealing with jazz and other arts, jazz as a business, and the jazz audience. An equally stimulating, if less literate, book aimed at the experienced jazz listener is Burnett James’s “Essays on Jazz” (Sidgwick and Jackson, 205 pp.). Mr James is a well-known English jazz critic and his eight essays here are mainly expansions of articles which first appeared in the English magazine “Jazz Monthly.” It is a reflective, rather academic collection, and Mr Janges is at his best when dealing with academic subjects such as the history of improvisation or the “impressionism” of Duke Ellington. These two essays are written with clarity and perception; at other times, however, Mr James’s style becomes positively murky. He seems unable to resist a tautology and in the chapter on Billie Holiday he goes on a spree of “intellectual” name-dropping. This, one supposes, is the price of a “serious” jazz book. Certainly the experienc d reader will find much challenging material in the eight essays, and, no doubt, much to disagree with. But it could only baffle the beginner.