Customer Reviews

American Musicians II: Seventy-Two Portraits in Jazz

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If Whitnet Balliett were a musician, he'd probably be someone like Teddy Wilson, whose sometimes spare but dancing lines were always distinct, no matter the context. Balliett's musings on the more important jazz musicians, published originally in The New Yorker, are models of criticism that never betray his love and admiration for the music. It is unlikely that anyone will ever write as well as he has about America's most important contribution to the arts.

I have been a musician and writer for over 50 years, and glory of glories, in Whitney Balliett's book, American Musicians II, he achieves perfect pitch in his prose when capturing the heart and soul of what music is, and the men and women who make it happen. His stories pulse with an energy that is seemingly boundless. Here is a man who has somehow gotten inside these legendary figures, some of whom I knew and many of whom I've heard in person. Balliett lets you listen through his own ears, giving you a guided tour not only of the notes on the page, and then as they take flight in the air, but also of the fascinating daily lives of these gifted individuals. I can't play like Art Tatum, but Balliett lets me sit beside him as he lays down his "perfect storm" of notes, at the end of which is this huge rainbow whose image we carry in our mind forever. If you love good music and good writing, you've come to the perfect book. Balliet is no longer with us, but he has left us a legacy that should be treasured for 32 bars unto infinity. Ron Levin, revronl@aol.com