27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
After reading this, I miss him more than ever, May 25, 2007
This review is from: Steve Goodman: Facing the Music (Paperback)
This is an exhaustively researched, passionately written biography of one of folk music's real treasures. The range of people interviewed, from playground pals to "really famous big time musicians" is huge, and the message is consistent--great talent, great sense of humor, great love of life, great man. I'll never forget any of the times I saw him; the last time, when his health was clearly fading and he was sharing a bill with John Prine came back to me like a film. Thank you for writing this book, thank you for keeping Steve Goodman alive. I hope you find a wide audience and that Steve is "discovered" by many more people.
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22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Remarkable Achievement, May 22, 2007
This review is from: Steve Goodman: Facing the Music (Paperback)
This biography is a remarkable achievement. Eals synthesizes a massive amount of material to construct not only a life but an era. It should be of interest to anyone moved by a period when folk music no longer meant either "like the hillbillies played" or "I Ain't Marchin' Anymore," but resisted in a different way the blandishments and selfishness of mainstream popular culture, with songs about old-fashioned girls and vegematics, Spoon River and 42nd Street, old black men and Door Number Three.
When Clay showed me an early draft of his opening chapter, in which he describes one of Steve's last performances as his illness was worsening, I worried that he risked stigmatizing the book, and thus Steve's legacy, with the mawkishness of a disease of the week tale of "courage." Clay acknowledged the risk to all of us who expressed concern, and yet pressed on, committed to the notion that there was a way to tell Steve's story in a way that was deeply human, and thus deeply universal.
Clay's accomplished that with the same humane artistry that Steve brought to his own craft. In so doing, he's created a kind of folk journalism for the early 21st century. It's not folk in the museum-sense of written with a quill pen harvested from a goose he raised himself. It's folk in the original meaning of the term, as being of the people, of being real in its regard for beauty and humor, delight and wit, musicianship and charm, family and friends, birth and death. Better get it while you can . . .
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good to see that a "good man" like Goodman is not forgotten soon., May 21, 2007
This review is from: Steve Goodman: Facing the Music (Paperback)
"Facing the Music" by gifted biographer, Clay Eals, captures not only Steve Goodman's brief but brillian life journey, but also the zeitgeist of his era with meticulous attention to detail. The book is a joy to simply browse, weighing in at almost the same weight as Goodman himself.
Even if you are not familiar with Goodman's impressive body of work as a composer,entertainer and inveterate Cubs fan, or with his songbook that ranges from the anthemic "City of New Orleans" to the bittersweet "Would You Like To Learn To Dance?"; even if you are not familiar with his tragic loss due to leukemia at age 36; this book is to be savored and enjoyed by anyone who cherishes the best of biographies.
So far I have read only two masterpiece biographies this year (May, 2007), Facing the Music by Eals and Einstein; the Man and his Universe by Isaacson. While both books involved enormous quantities of research, it's Eals' work that smacks of "life's obsession." Over nine years in the making, containing hundreds of interviews, never-before-seen photos, and an Acknowledgement section that reads like a folk music phone book, "Facing the Music" gives new meaning to the terms: Opus and Tour de Force.
All of this output would be meaningless, however, if the subject and the writing style were not inherently engaging. Fortunately they are both. Eals writes in an elegant and embracing voice that draws you in further with each carefully placed paragraph. And, having met Steve Goodman on numerous occasions, I can attest that Eals succeeds in effectively exploring the artist's varied dimensions. He offers well-deserved praise without turning the book into an 800 page obituary notice. The style of the book borders on journalism rather than classic biography. Eals works hard to depict Goodman through the eyes of those who knew him best. The constant stream of anecdotes, insights and episodes is addictive and makes it painful to stop reading.
Eals' over-arching theme is that Goodman's recognition of his own mortality colored all of his work. The positive message is that Goodman's artistic reaction to his own imminent demise was not mordant dirges of doom. Instead, he appeared to look death squarely in the eye as he strove to "get it while you can."
In the closing lyric of a tribute song that I wrote in Steve Goodman's memory shortly after his death in 1984, I respond to a query that Steve poses in his iconic "A Dying Cub Fan's Last Request," which was: "Do they still sing the blues in Chicago?" The author was kind enough to include my song, along with 17 other tribute tunes, on a CD included with the book. In it I reply:
"Yes they still sing the blues in Old Chicago, boys,
Where a good man's not forgotten soon.
His songs meant so much
To the lives that were touched
By the Man With The Golden Tune."
Thank you, Clay, for insuring that my words will ring true, not just in Old Chicago, but everywhere where people read and enjoy this masterwork biography.
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