Background
Davis, Francis John was born on August 30, 1946 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Son of Dorothy M. (McCartney) Davis.
(With his essays on jazz for a variety of publications, in...)
With his essays on jazz for a variety of publications, including The Atlantic, 7 Days, and The Village Voice, Francis Davis has established himself as a major voice in jazz criticism. In the Moment, his first collection, published in 1986, won praise from both the jazz and general press. down beat called it "a collection as useful to future generations for how it captures this moment in musical evolution as for how it alters our vision now." The New York Times Book Review compared it to "a well-blown solo." In Outcats, Davis presents a new series of critical essays, artist profiles, and pieces that skillfully combine both modes. In the 1950s, Paul Knopf, a now forgotten and even then obscure pianist, coined the word "outcat" to describe himself as "an outcast and a far-out cat combined." In using a word originally meant to convey jubilant defiance, Davis recognizes its undertones of alienation and cultural exile. Some of his subjects are outcats because of their politics, drug problems, or musical iconoclasm. But Davis defines all jazz performers--"including the most famous, influential, and housebroken"--as outcats, by virtue of the scant recognition given them by contemporary society. Like In the Moment, Outcats is an indispensible guide to the best in recent and reissued jazz. Davis illuminates the unusual aspects of famous performers--Duke Ellington composing an opera, for example, or Miles Davis talking about his move into pop--while deftly analyzing their music. His subjects range from the mainstream to the experimental, from the familiar to the forgotten; from Frank Sinatra, Billie Holiday, and Wynton Marsalis to Cecil Taylor, John Zorn, and Sun Ra. Whether challenging the portrayal of Charlie Parker in Bird or admitting to his own fondness for the rock singer Bobby Darin, Davis writes with wit, sensitivity, and candor. As Pauline Kael describes him, "He gets at what he responds to and why--you feel you're reading an honest man."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/019507470X/?tag=2022091-20
( Francis Davis's The History of the Blues is a groundbre...)
Francis Davis's The History of the Blues is a groundbreaking rethinking of the blues that fearlessly examines how race relations have altered perceptions of the music. Tracing its origins from the Mississippi Delta to its amplification in Chicago right after World War II, Davis argues for an examination of the blues in its own right, not just as a precursor to jazz and rock 'n' roll. The lives of major figures such as Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton, and Leadbelly, in addition to contemporary artists such as Stevie Ray Vaughan and Robert Cray, are examined and skillfully woven into a riveting, provocative narrative.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0306812967/?tag=2022091-20
Davis, Francis John was born on August 30, 1946 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Son of Dorothy M. (McCartney) Davis.
He attended Temple University (1964-1969). He emerged in the early 1980s as the jazz critic for The Philadelphia Inquirer.
He is best known as the jazz critic for The Village Voice, and a contributing editor for The Atlantic Monthly. He has also worked in radio and film, and taught courses on Jazz and Blues at the University of Pennsylvania. He was a 1994 recipient of the Pew Fellowships in the Arts.
Davis is characterized by his keen insights into the development of American style and culture, with asides in the first person that balance his theoretical certainty and a witty, human element.
His articles and essays on figures ranging from Frank Sinatra to Anthony Davis impart a sharp picture of a writer coming of age, and aging, with the artists of his generation. Over the past few decades he has sat with Betty Carter, Sonny Rollins, Wynton Marsalis, Sun Ra, and the late New Yorker film critic, Pauline Kael, after whose lengthy discussions Davis penned, Afterglow: A Last Conversation with Pauline Kael.
Along with international publication Davis has been widely recognized with awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1992, and a Pew Fellowship the following year. Stanley Crouch, a famed jazz critic who frequently writes about race relations, took Davis to task in a 2003 Jazz Times column for allegedly speaking with condescension toward the predominantly black contingent of musicians who create "jazz that is based on swing and blues." Because of what Crouch alleges to be underlying racial resentment and fear, Davis "lifts up someone like, say, Dave Douglas as an antidote to too much authority from the dark side of the tracks," according to Crouch.
Crouch was fired from Jazz Times after writing the column.
(On September 3, 2001, the movies and those who love them ...)
(With his essays on jazz for a variety of publications, in...)
(With his essays on jazz for a variety of publications, in...)
( Francis Davis's The History of the Blues is a groundbre...)
Member National Writers Union, Jazz Journalists Association.