The Blue Devils of Nada: A Contemporary American Approach to Aesthetic Statement [Paperback]

Albert Murray (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 24, 1997

Murray gives readers the redefined essence of his lifetime meditation on the blues as this musical style informs American life. Here are incisive essays on writing, music, and art that go beyond the social-science fiction of Negrohood to describe in no uncertain terms what it means to be American.


From the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Long one of American literature's overlooked resources, novelist and essayist Murray (Stomping the Blues, LJ 2/1/77) here uses his considerable talent to ruminate on the impact of African American music on 20th-century American culture. Applying both his lifetime love of the jazz and blues idioms and his personal relationships with musical giants such as Duke Ellington and Count Basie, Murray examines the music in terms of the human, not merely the black, experience. It is in the human experience that Murray sees the essence of all culture?painting, music, or literature. Using the work of Ernest Hemingway as an illustration, he makes the point that treating art as sociopolitical protest is taking the easy way out. The aesthetic of jazz and blues looks for the universal in us all and celebrates it. This thoughtful book is essential for all humanities collections. [For a review of Murray's latest novel see p. 158.?Ed.]?Dan Bogey, Clearfield Cty. P.L. Federation, Curwensville, Pa.
-?Dan Bogey, Clearfield Cty. P.L. Federation, Curwensville, Pa.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Mr. Murray writes beautifully about the lives and technical achievements of the black musicians he so lovingly portrays.... -- The New York Times Book Review, Charles Johnson

This book has honorable intentions and high ambitions. Murray wants to demonstrate the centrality of Black artistic achievement to the American imagination. He talks about the indomitable sense of style the great blues singers took from sufferings endured, about the ways Ellington, Armstrong, and Basie transformed country and city sounds into a national music unimagined by the conservatory-trained, and about how the jazz improviser draws on discipline the better to discover new freedoms. Jazz, Murray claims, is not just a kind of music but a way of feeling and knowing, the definitive aesthetic form of American life. So this is a work of practical criticism, unconstrained in its likes and dislikes, in its determination to make the reader see. That's a good thing, but this is not a very good book. It subverts its own enthusiasms with a lack of humor, and for all its talk of improvisatory range, strikes for the most part one scoldingly earnest note. Murray promises a lot, but he lacks the chops to perform.
Copyright © 1996, Boston Review. All rights reserved. -- From The Boston Review

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Product Details

• Paperback: 252 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (June 24, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679758593
• ISBN-13: 978-0679758594
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #691,069 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Unsquarest Cat I Know, March 5, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Blue Devils of Nada: A Contemporary American Approach to Aesthetic Statement (Hardcover)

Duke Ellington called Albert Murray "The Unsquarest Cat I Know." This book shows why - Murray's style manages to be insightful without being pretentious.

0 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good, June 29, 2009

By 

Leah N. Landry - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Blue Devils of Nada: A Contemporary American Approach to Aesthetic Statement (Paperback)

The book arrived promptly, and I am very satisfied with the condition of the product. The seller was very honest and thorough about the condition of his or her product.