Features
- Cover Type: Paperback with 1378 pages
- Published by: Backbeat Books
- Edition: 3rd Edition 1998
- Written in: English
- ISBN 10 Number: 0879305304
- ISBN 13 Number: 978-0879305307
-
Book Dimensions:
8.8 x 7.2 x 1.7 inches
- Weighs: 5.9 pounds
Product Review
The
AMG Jazz encyclopedia is the resource of choice for anything you might care to know about
jazz musicians, jazz history, and jazz recordings. The print is small and there's not a lot of space wasted on photographs and filler--in fact, the only non-text additions are 51 music maps, smartly illustrating which performers played in which categories of a range of topics, from accordion and big bands to vocal groups and significant fusion players. There are short essays on topics like ragtime, cool, acid jazz, jazz history, and jazz in film, plus indexes for jazz books, venues, and videos, producers, writers, and labels, and a much-appreciated comprehensive index. The bulk of this extraordinary reference, however, consists of musician profiles (more than 1,700) and reviews of their recordings (more than 18,000), arranged alphabetically from Greg Abate to John Zorn, providing biographical details of well-known figures such as Artie Shaw, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, as well as his son T.S. Monk and more unusual artists such as Don Byas, Richard Tabnik, Oscar Pettiford, Hot Lips Page, and Chubby Jackson.
The profiles are well researched, short, and richly informative and entertaining. Take Bob Scobey, for example. In one brief paragraph, you learn he was a Dixieland trumpet player and band leader from Tucumcari, New Mexico, lived from December 9, 1916 to June 12, 1963, and was a popular trumpeter in his prime. He played in Watter's Yerba Buena Jazz Band in San Francisco (one of the most influential bands in the Dixieland revival), formed his own Frisco Jazz Band, opened Club Bourbon Street in 1959 in Chicago, and died four years later of cancer at 46. The profiles are reason enough to appreciate
AMG Jazz, but the recording reviews are even more impressive. Following each biography is a comprehensive list of the artist's recordings, with a star rating (0 to 5), information about who plays what, how long it runs, what sort of music it is, notable high points, low points, or both, and any other songs or notes of historic or musical interest. Mesmerizingly addictive to
jazz musicians, accessibly, enjoyably instructive to the novice, reliably erudite for the scholar, vastly entertaining for the browser, and irreplaceable as a CD-purchase guide, the
All Music Guide to Jazz sets the standard for what a music-reference book should be.
--Stephanie Gold
From Library Journal
There is certainly no current dearth of buyer's guides to recorded jazz. The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz (LJ 3/1/95), The Penguin Guide to Jazz (Penguin, 1996), and Jazz: The Rough Guide (LJ 3/1/96) are now joined by a third edition of the All Music Guide to Jazz (LJ 9/1/96. 1st ed.) and Musichound Jazz. These two guides are very similar in content and coverage, with some significant differences in approach. Both consist of biographical entries, ranging in length from a mere paragraph to several pages, followed by discographical listings with some kind of rating system. Musichound covers almost 1300 artists in 1390 pages, while All Music has over 1700 entries in 1378 pages (employing a somewhat smaller font). The biographical entries in both tend to be more in-depth than those found in Jazz: The Rough Guide and cover a much wider range of artists than found in the more conservative Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz. Quite helpful and easy to read, Musichound covers in essay style which recordings to buy first, which to buy next, which to avoid, and which are rare but worth hunting. It also manages to include several artists' birthdates that do not appear elsewhere, giving it added strength as a reference source. All Music presents its listings in chronological order, employing a system of symbols indicating essential collections and recommended first purchases, as well as a rating system. The discussion of each individual recording seems designed to stand on its own, which makes for some repetition. This edition of All Music corrects many of the errors that plagued earlier ones. Both books are recommended; the library that can only obtain one might opt for All Music, since it is more comprehensive, but it would be a very close call.?Michael Colby, Univ. of California, Davis
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Reader Reviews
I use both the All Music Guide to Jazz and the Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD. If I had to choose between them, I'd choose the All Music Guide because of the capsule biographies (including birth and death dates) of each artist that are included with every entry. Also, it lists more albums, although some of them are not on CD, but on vinyl only. I also love that it has such a wealth of additional material: music histories and charts of the various genres, "maps" of significant players, and even essays and book reviews! Books about jazz and biographies of jazz artists are reviewed; if that weren't enough, there are also listings and reviews of jazz videos! Truly a wonderful book! In most ways it is much more complete than the Penguin Guide, for example, in the All Music Guide, there are 89 listings under "John Coltrane" whereas in the Penguin Guide there are only 66. On the other hand, many of the Penguin reviews are more lengthy and in-depth than those in the All Music Guide. For myself -- I need both of them!
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