LizzieMaine
Bartender
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- Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
Lizzie, do you feel that his contribution has worn-off considerably in the last 50 years? And that the book is still valuable if balanced out with other jazz-history sources?
Well, I think his real impact has been the idea that jazz-oriented bands were the only bands that produced any music of worth. As a jazz critic, he's certainly entitled to that opinion -- but when it becomes the *default* view because his book is considered the "definitive study of the era," that's where I have a problem. The snooty postwar jazz-scholar college boys might turn up their noses at a Johnny Green or a Richard Himber or a Kay Kyser record -- but that shouldn't make those bands any less worthy of your time. The "big band era" *wasn't* just about jazz.