Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Detailed Story of the Winter Dance Party, September 30, 2000
Author Larry Lehmer has provided readers with a very detailed story of the events that led up to the deaths of early rock and roll stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, J. P. Richardson, and pilot Roger Peterson. Individual chapters are provided on each individual and a thorough description of the various cities the rock stars visited during the Winter Dance Party in the Upper Midwest beginning in January of 1959. Due to inadequate bus transportation with little or no heat, the three singers decided to charter an airplane from Clear Lake, Iowa, to Fargo, North Dakota, for their next performance in Moorhead, Minnesota, to arrive early and get some needed rest. The crash of the airplane was due to poor flying conditions and the inadequate skills of the pilot in flying by instruments. The author explores other theories such as a fight on the plane or, incredibly, Buddy Holly shooting the pilot. Author Lehmer also provides a great deal of information on the airplane that was used and what has become of the arenas the singers used for their performances in each of the visited cities. Numerous photos of the singers during this Winter Dance Tour and of the crash site are also provided. Some readers may feel they are being told more than they want to know about this subject, but the author has done an incredible job in covering this story of this incident and what rock and roll was like during the late 1950's.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The best book I've seen on the subject, September 10, 2001
Lehmer's book is downright exhaustive in the coverage of the fateful Feb. 3 1959 plane crash that killed Holly, Valens, and Richardson.I appreciated the detail and content of this book a lot. Being from Iowa, I have been interested in the Winter Dance party, and accounts of the crash for a very long time. (In fact, I just visited the Surf Ballroom and Mason City Airport while returning from a recent weekend vacation.) Lehmer's book is very well-balanced, with chapters devoted to each of the three headliners. And it also has detailed plane crash info as well as analysis of the official CAB report. In my opinion, easily the best book on "The Day The Music Died".
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Day the Music Died by Larry Lehmer, January 24, 1998
Larry Lehmer has written a very well researched and thoroughly detailed book. The last time that I read a book that paid this close of attention to detail was "Truman" by David McCullough. Lehmer takes the time to give a biography of each star, as well as the story of their often forgotten pilot, Roger Peterson. In addition, Lehmer explores each theory of how the doomed aircraft may have gone down, remote as some of those possibilities may be. Lehmer's interviews with people who were actually on the Winter Dance Party tour with the three stars gives the reader a first-hand experience that would not have been possible with book research alone. He is able to portray the human aspect of the tragedy, as opposed to simply a timeline account. Never a dull moment, Lehmer's writing makes this book a joy to read. He doesn't leave a single thing out, providing the most thorough account of the Winter Dance Party tour, and, ultimately, the plane crash, to date.
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