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Double Bass DB forum "what books are you reading" thread

#121
Just finished "Moving to Higher Ground" by Wynton Marsalis. I have to say I was underwhelmed. Although he is a master player, I'm not sure that this qualifies him to be an exceptional writer and or thinker.

Some of the things he says about drummers and bass players and rhythm sections is, at best, unenlightened.

Mr. Marsalis has very definite and strong opinions. He obviously thinks very highly of himself. I certainly would not recommend this book.:ninja::ninja:
 
#123
moles said:
Just started Pride & Prejudice & Zombies - bought it a couple of weeks ago. Never did read the original, and hey, it's got zombies now...
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I've read about this and just ordered it (his next book is going to be called "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter"). It looks like a hoot. Pride and Prejudice is probably my favorite Austen book but it's probably not one I'll read again because trying to get through 18th century prose is too much of a slog for me nowadays. It's like reading a foreign language.

I hope it's good and not the literary equivalent of an SNL skit expanded to feature length (It's Pat anyone?) where the idea is funnier than the execution.

mark
 
#126
Treyzer said:
Just finished "Moving to Higher Ground" by Wynton Marsalis. I have to say I was underwhelmed. Although he is a master player, I'm not sure that this qualifies him to be an exceptional writer and or thinker.

Some of the things he says about drummers and bass players and rhythm sections is, at best, unenlightened.

Mr. Marsalis has very definite and strong opinions. He obviously thinks very highly of himself. I certainly would not recommend this book.:ninja::ninja:
Click to expand...

If you buy into his world view, he's a genius. If you don't, you'll want to throw the book across the room before page 5. If you think jazz pretty much stopped in 1940 and certainly stopped by 1960, Wynton's your guy. If you think something of value may have happened in jazz in the last 50 years, then he can be kind of irritating. He's a great player though. The man can really play.

Here's a bit about bass players and drummers (from the AMAZON website):

"The central relationship on the bandstand is between the bass and the drums. They’re opposites of volume and register. The drums are the loudest and the swung cymbal is the highest-pitched while the bass is the softest and lowest-pitched. In order to swing, the right-hand stroke on the cymbal must find the right-hand pluck of the bass on every beat. While it is impossible to line those beats up with metronomic perfection it is possible to achieve a perfect intent to be together. That’s what you would like to see with a mama and a daddy. They represent gender opposites. While they try to come together to solve a problem we can go in the direction of a good time. When they don’t--when one is too loud or the other is unyielding--it becomes a matter of endurance, not swinging. "

Ok. The obvious problems are: 1) the bass isn't the softest instrument in the band anymore since the invention of amplifiers oh 40 years ago (although he not so subtly addresses that with the "when one is too loud" comment which is a direct dig at bassists using amplifiers). 2) if you don't play in lock step with the ride cymbal, you aren't SWINGING?!? REALLY?!? The central conceit in his world view is that if you don't do things the way he sees it, you aren't swinging. And if you aren't overtly swinging, it isn't jazz. Everything he writes about proceeds from this premise which, if you don't agree with (and I don't) can make reading him incredibly irritating.

I still wouldn't turn down a gig with him though.

mark
 
#127
calivox said:
If you buy into his world view, he's a genius. If you don't, you'll want to throw the book across the room before page 5. If you think jazz pretty much stopped in 1940 and certainly stopped by 1960, Wynton's your guy. If you think something of value may have happened in jazz in the last 50 years, then he can be kind of irritating. He's a great player though. The man can really play.
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Mark this is so well stated. I PMed Chris with a more in depth critique. I didn't want to stir anything up so I just basically stated I'm not a fan.

All the best

Trey:cool:
 
#128
Reading the new biography of Scott LaFaro: "Jade Visions: The Life and Music of Scott LaFaro" written by his sister, Helene LaFaro-Fernández. Very thorough and well-written account with additional material from Don Thompson, Jeff Campbell, Phil Palombi, B. Kolstein and others.

Scott only made about 20 official recordings in his career, but what a legacy he left behind.
 
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#133
Chris Fitzgerald said:
While cleaning out the basement this summer (ugh), I stumbled upon a Milan Kundera novel I'd never read called "The Joke". Turns out it's his first novel, and not surprisingly, it's excellent.
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Very cool Chris, I will add this to my reading list. Based on the suggestions from other bassists on this forum, I took a shot at Al Coopers "Backstage Passes and Backstabbing Bastards", very funny and one of pop/rock music's outstanding journeyman; "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy, very bleak and depressing but wonderfully written in a style that evokes Hemingway; and "Raptor" by Gary Jennings, a truly wild, weird and very inventive look at the Gothic civilization circa 400 AD as told and seen through the eyes of the main character who just happens to be a hermaphrodite!

Thanks one and all for the ideas. keep them coming!

Aloha

T:)
 
#135
salcott said:
"Idiot America; How Stupidity became a Virtue in the Land of the Free", by Charles P. Pierce.
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Salcott,

Is this a serious book or is it meant to be funny? Many mass forms of entertainment seemed to have been dumbed down over the years. If you watch any news panel shows, it seems that everyone is yelling and/or talking at once. Many people do not read much anymore. As a teacher, this is quite depressing! There are so many things wrong with our public school system and many ideas involving the concept of self-esteem as well as a national obsession with self-entitlement have also seemed to change our overall culture in the last twenty odd years. I would be very interested in hearing more about this book.
 
#136
Treyzer said:
"The Road" by Cormac McCarthy, very bleak and depressing but wonderfully written in a style that evokes Hemingway;
T:)
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Bleak and depressing in setting but inspired with love in substance. For me the love involved with being on the brink survival is problably the purest and it really comes through in that book. I feel the Hemingway too. Like "For Whom The Bell Tolls," it reeks of the duty of love and that touches me like little else.
 
#138
Currently reading The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World - Lewis Hyde
Recently read: Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa
Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate by Brad Warner

A few music bios I recommend:
An Unsung Cat Warne Marsh bio
Johann Sebestian Bach - The Learned Musician by Christoph Wolff
Jazz Visions Peter Ind's memoir/Lennie Tristano bio
Lewis Porter's Lester Young and John Coltrane

And recently discovered Mary Oliver New and Selected Poems
 

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