Preservation Hall: Music From the Heart (Bayou Press) [Paperback]

William Carter (Author)

Book Description

Series: Bayou Press | Publication Date: August 31, 1999

On St. Peter Street, in the heart of the French Quarter of New Orleans, stands Preservation Hall, an institution unique in American cultural and musical life. Here traditional jazz has been played nearly every night since the early 1960s. Preservation Hall bands have also traveled worldwide. William Carter tells the story of the Hall itself, the personalities who ran it and the music and musicians of New Orleans. Preservation Hall has played host to jazz fans from all parts of the world, musicians and listeners alike. In this lavishly illustrated book, a series of vignettes is interwoven with the narrative, covering, for example, many of the great personalities of early jazz, the story of early recording pioneer William Russell, and the steamy dance halls of Luthjen's and Speck's Moulin Rouge. William Carter brilliantly captures the essence of this colorful chapter in America's musical history. Photographs by William Carter.>

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Product Details

• Paperback: 344 pages
• Publisher: Continuum (August 31, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0304705179
• ISBN-13: 978-0304705177
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 7.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #724,466 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Trad Jazz Alive and Well in New Orleans, November 27, 2002

By 

A Southern Reader (New Orleans, LA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Preservation Hall: Music From the Heart (Bayou Press) (Paperback)

This is a wonderful book. Mr. Carter has done an excellent job
describing the origins and growth of Preservation Hall, the citadel of traditional New Orleans jazz at 726 St. Peter St.
He profiles many of the musicians who played at the Hall, and manages to do it in such a way that the reader keeps turning the pages. I usually run out of steam about the middle of books like this one, but that was not the case with this one.

If you enjoy traditional New Orleans jazz, and have ever been to or plan to go to Preseration Hall, you gotta read this book.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Memories, Musicians Preserved in Classic Jazz Bio, April 23, 2003

By 

Anthony G Pizza "trivialtony" (FL) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Preservation Hall: Music From the Heart (Bayou Press) (Paperback)

William Carter's extraordinary, exhaustive history of Preservation Hall is a love letter not only to New Orleans' venerable rebirthplace of traditional jazz, but to 40 years' musical and personal lives of those watching over it and playing in it.

Carter covers all the bases tracing the Hall's timeline: its creation, mission, musicians and the songs and lives they preserved. He recalls the Hall's strong-willed, soft-hearted entreprenuers, Larry Bornstein and Allen and Sandra Jaffe. He carefully charts musical and personal histories of band members and local legends like trombonist Jim Robinson, drummer Cie Frazier and irrepressible pianist 'Sweet' Emma Barrett (who judging from her spotlight among several breakout pieces, was often sour, bitter, or salty). You realize, as it stands amidst seedy strip clubs and franchises like Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville, Preservation Hall exists for those loving the music for what it does for and to them, not the flash it throws at them.

Carter writes that 'enjoy' has the impact in New Orleans 'achieve' has in the rest of the country. But as 'Preservation Hall' winds down you see those words as synonyms describing the feisty comeraderie these heritage musicians brought their work. You come to love their quirks on and offstage, (Carter splits his postscript between hilarious band anecdotes and heartfelt celebrity tributes). You see and hear joy they brought audiences worldwide, including US presidents, Supreme Court Justices and icons like Woody Allen, Frank Sinatra, and Mick Jagger. The Hall and its music helped draw tourists back to New Orleans when the city rebuilt its vacation trade on its jazz and party history. You mourn as original band members, for whom the Hall and its tours provided their long-running work and steadiest income, pass from the scene followed by their manager/mentors, Bornstein and Jaffe.

The book justifiably praises Louis Armstrong, Sidney Bechet, Kid Ory, Buddy Bolden and other legendary New Orleans jazzmen, whose spirits pervade every block of Bourbon Street and whose legacy the Hall preserves, not exploits. But sadly, it also charts unkind potshots from modern band members like Dr. Michael White. His disparaging comments about 'a bearded, pot-bellied guy standing there blasting Louis Armstrong solos at 90 miles an hour" seem aimed at Al Hirt and Pete Fountain, men who also loved classic New Orleans jazz, took it mainstream and whetted American appetite for it during the early 1960s "folk music" boom. This is an example of what is at best provincialism or what Carter calls 'Crow Jimism,' a reverse descrimination (acknowledged and hinted at in some of Jaffe's printed interview remarks) where every older black musician is thought more authentic, and thus better, at his instrument than his white counterpart.

'Preservation Hall' will delight those wanting to understand more about New Orleans' rich jazz history, or wanting an historical recreation broken up by hilarious anecdotes and great music. If the book came with a complete musician's list and discography (or better yet, a sample CD!) it would have been perfect. But everyone reading 'Preservation Hall' will rest it hearing New Orleans jazz in their minds, or wanting to.