Background
Balliett, Whitney was born on April 17, 1926 in New York City. Son of Fargo and Dorothy (Lyon) Balliett.
(Whitney Balliett's new book contains many of the shorter ...)
Whitney Balliett's new book contains many of the shorter pieces he has done for The New Yorker during the past ten years. (The pieces on the pianist Bill Evans and on the classic 1957 CBS television show, "The Sound of Jazz," have not been published before.) Balliett gives brilliant final summings-up of many of the irreplaceable musicians who died in the eighties, among them Count Basie, Earl Hines, Thelonious Monk, Buddy Rich, Sarah Vaughan, and Cootie Williams. But he also offers penetrating assessements of young turks like Michael Petrucciani, Warren Vache, Howard Alden, and Wynton Marsalis. Jazz is passing through a recollective period, and Balliett takes long looks at the great Blue Note, Keynote, and Commodore reissue programs, the new jazz repertory groups, and the ambitious and wayward Grove Dictionary of Jazz. He puts his elegant glass on a Caribbean jazz cruise, on several different festivals, on the sad dissolution of the marvelous Gene Bertoncini-Michael Moore duo, and on the strange career of Miles Davis. And he gives us definitive essays on Bunny Berigan, Duke Ellington, John Hammond, Benny Goodman, Ben Webster, and the early lyrical jazz writer Otis Ferguson. Jazz fans and jazz musicians read Balliett because of his unrivalled ability to convey in words the very sound of their music. But people who don't know beans about jazz read him simply to relish his elegant and beautiful prose.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/019503757X/?tag=2022091-20
(3rd collection of profiles of musicians, reviews, "apprec...)
3rd collection of profiles of musicians, reviews, "appreciations", criticism from the long-time jazz music critic for the "New Yorker".
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0007DRDIC/?tag=2022091-20
( Jazz critic for The New Yorker since 1957 and the autho...)
Jazz critic for The New Yorker since 1957 and the author of some fifteen books, Whitney Balliett has spent a lifetime listening to and writing about jazz. "All first-rate criticism," he once wrote in a review, "first defines what we are confronting." He could as easily have been describing his own work. For nearly half a century, Balliett has been telling us, in his widely acclaimed pitch-perfect prose, what we are confronting when we listen to America's greatest--and perhaps only original--musical form. Collected Works: A Journal of Jazz 1954-2001 is a monumental achievement, capturing the full range and register of the jazz scene, from the very first Newport Jazz Festival to recent performances (in clubs and on CDs) by a rising generation of musicians. Here are definitive portraits of such major figures as Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Django Reinhardt, Martha Raye, Buddy Rich, Charles Mingus, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holliday, Art Tatum, Bessie Smith, and Earl Hines--a list that barely scratches the surface. Generations of readers have learned to listen to the music with Balliett's graceful guidance. For five decades he has captured those moments during which jazz history is made. Though Balliett's knowledge is an encyclopedic treasure, he has always written as if he were listening for the first time. Since its beginnings in New Orleans at the turn of the century, jazz has been restlessly and relentlessly evolving. This is an art form based on improvising, experimenting, shapeshifting--a constant work in progress of sounds and tonal shades, from swing and Dixieland, through boogie-woogie, bebop, and hard bop, to the "new thing," free jazz, abstract jazz, and atonal jazz. Yet, in all its forms, the music is forever sustained by what Balliett calls a "secret emotional center," an "aural elixir" that "reveals itself when an improvised phrase or an entire solo or even a complete number catches you by surprise." Balliett's celebrated essays invariably capture the so-called "sound of surprise"--and then share this sound with general readers, music students, jazz lovers, and popular American culture buffs everywhere. As The Los Angeles Times Book Review has observed, "Few people can write as well about anything as Balliett writes about jazz."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312270089/?tag=2022091-20
(American Musicians, Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big ...)
American Musicians, Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big book," contains a wealth of jazz profiles he has written for The New Yorker during the past twenty-seven years. He gives us, in this spectacular volume, his famous early portraits of Pee Wee Russell, Red Allen, Earl Hines, and Mary Lou Williams, written in their brilliant twilight years; his reconstructions of the lives of such legends as Sidney Bechet, Coleman Hawkins, Jack Teagarden, Zoot Sims, and Sidney Catlett; his brief but indelible glimpses into the daily (or nocturnal) lives of Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus; and his vivid depictions of such on-the-scene masters as Jim Hall, Ornette Coleman, Stéphane Grappelli, Elvin Jones, Art Farmer, the Modern Jazz Quartet, and Tommy Flanagan. He also includes his thoughts on such lesser known but invaluable players as Art Hodes, Jabbo Smith, Joe Wilder, Warne Marsh, Gene Bertoncini, and Joe Bushkin. American Musicians is at once a history of jazz, a biographical encyclopedia of many of its most important performers, and a model of American prose.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0195060881/?tag=2022091-20
( As jazz critic for The New Yorker magazine since 1957, ...)
As jazz critic for The New Yorker magazine since 1957, and the author of fifteen books, Whitney Balliett has spent a lifetime listening to and writing about jazz. "All first-rate criticism," he once wrote in a review of someone else's work, "first defines what we are confronting." He could as easily have been describing his own work. For nearly half a century, Balliett has been telling us, in pitch-perfect prose, what we confront when we listen to America's greatest, and perhaps only truly original, musical form. Collected Works: A Journal of Jazz 1954-2000 is a monumental achievement, capturing the full range and register of the jazz scene, from the first Newport Jazz Festival in 1954 to recent performances by a rising generation of musicians. Here are definitive portraits of such major figures as: Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Django Reinhardt, Martha Raye, Buddy Rich, Charles Mingus, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holliday, Art Tatum, Bessie Smith, and Earl Hines-a list that barely scratches the surface. Generations of readers have learned to listen to the music with Balliett's graceful guidance. For five decades he has captured the moments when jazz history was being made. Balliett's knowledge is encyclopedic treasure and yet he has always written as if he were listening for the first time. Since its beginnings in New Orleans at the turn of the century, jazz has been restlessly and relentlessly evolving, improvising, experimenting, shapeshifting, a constant work in progress of sounds and tonal shades, from swing and dixieland, through boogie-woogie, bebop, and hard bop, to the new thing, free jazz, abstract jazz, and atonal jazz. Yet in all its forms, the music is sustained by what Balliett calls a "secret emotional center," an "aural elixir" that "reveals itself when an improvised phrase or an entire solo or even a complete number catches you by surprise." Whitney Balliett performs the miracle of capturing the essence of jazz-the "sound of surprise."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312202881/?tag=2022091-20
(This is Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big book." In it...)
This is Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big book." In it are all the jazz profiles he has written for The New Yorker during the past 24 years. These include his famous early portraits of Pee Wee Russell, Red Allen, Earl Hines, and Mary Lou Williams, done when these giants were in full flower; his recent reconstructions of the lives of such legends as Art Tatum, Coleman Hawkins, Jack Teagarden, Zoot Sims, and Dave Tough; His quick but indelible glimpses into the daily (or nocturnal) lives of Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus; and his vivid pictures of such on-the-scene masters as Red Norvo, Ornette Coleman, Buddy Rich, Elvin Jones, Art Farmer, Michael Moore, and Tommy Flanagan. Also included are such lesser known but invaluable players as Art Hodes, Jabbo Smith, Joe Wilder, Warne Marsh, Gene Bertoncini, Joe Bushkin, and Marie Marcus. All these profiles make the reader feel, as one observer has pointed out, that he is "sitting with Balliett and his subject and listening in." The book can be taken as a kind of history of jazz, as well as a biographical encylopedia of many of its most important performers. It can also be regarded as a model of American prose. Robert Dawidoff said of Whitney Balliett"s most recent book, Jelly Roll, Jabbo and Fats, that "few people write as well about anything as Balliett writes about jazz." And the late Philip Larkin wrote in 1982 of the "transcendence of Balliett's prose."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0195037588/?tag=2022091-20
(Whitney Balliett, jazz critic for The New Yorker for more...)
Whitney Balliett, jazz critic for The New Yorker for more than 30 years, is one of America's foremost jazz writers. "The most literate and knowledgeable living writer on jazz," Alistair Cooke called him, and Robert Dawidoff has written, "few people write as well about anything as Balliett writes about jazz." Two previous collections, American Musicians and American Singers, which gathered, respectively, Balliett's New Yorker profiles of jazz instrumentalists, and his essays about jazz singers, were widely acclaimed. This new book, intended as a supplement to American Musicians, offers sixteen additional profiles--seven of which have never appeared in book form before. (The article on clarinettist Buddy De Franco has never been printed anywhere. The eight previously published works have been culled from long-out-of-print books.) As Balliett tells us in an introductory note, the book is structured to take us "from the edges of jazz to its heart." Beginning with a profile of the jazz fan Jean Bach, who calls herself "the first jazz groupie," he continues with club owners Max Gordon (The Village Vanguard), Barney Josephson (Cafe Society), and Bradley Cunningham (Bradley's), and finally introduces us to such virtuoso jazz musicians as Benny Goodman and Charlie "Bird" Parker. In between are thoughtful pieces about pianists Claude Thornhill, Mel Powell, and George Shearing; trumpet player Ruby Braff; and more. All the classic Balliett touches are here: his sensitivity to the nuances of both music and personality, his ability to describe the subtleties of tone and rhythm, and, of course, the lyric quality of his own writing. Here is his report of Jimmy Rowles' warm-up routine: "In one motion, he sat down, leaned over, poised his fingers a second over the keyboard, and sank into a very slow 'Mood Indigo.' He moved in a gentle, circular fashion, as if he were leafing through a stamp album, and he punctuated his felicitous phrases by pointing his right toe at the ceiling." Balliett fans and jazz aficionados, as well as lovers of good writing will welcome this new collection by the man the late Philip Larkin said "brings jazz journalism to the verge of poetry."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0195061241/?tag=2022091-20
( Renowned jazz critic Whitney Balliett loves New York. A...)
Renowned jazz critic Whitney Balliett loves New York. A longtime columnist and critic for the New Yorker, he has written about the city's artistic side and night life for fifty years. In many ways his writings have helped define the culture of a metropolis where artistic activity is a major attraction. In New York Voices Balliett moves beyond the portraits of jazz artists for which he is most famous to write biographies of fourteen gifted people from abroad and around the United States. They settled in New York, celebrated it, and rose to the top of their professions. Each of these portraits focuses on an individual who makes a living in the arts and whose work contains a strong improvisational element. As with the best jazz musicians, many of these individuals work with live audiences and without a safety net. Those portrayed include nightclub owners Barney Josephson, Bradley Cunningham, and Max Gordon; comedians Jackie Mason and Bob and Ray; painter Jon Schueler; entrepreneur, writer, and director Julius Monk; and Lola Szladits, who oversees the Berg Collection at the New York Public Library. Whitney Balliett wrote for the New Yorker for fifty years and was the jazz critic there for over forty years. He is the author of many books, including American Musicians II: Seventy-one Portraits in Jazz, American Singers: Twenty-seven Portraits in Song, and Collected Works: A Journal of Jazz, 1954-2001. He received an award for excellence in literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and three of his books on jazz have won awards from ASCAP.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1578068363/?tag=2022091-20
Balliett, Whitney was born on April 17, 1926 in New York City. Son of Fargo and Dorothy (Lyon) Balliett.
Bachelor with honors, Cornell Univercity, 1951.
Member editorial staff, New Yorker magazine, New York City, since 1951; successively collator, proofreader, reporter, New Yorker magazine, New York City, 1951-1957; staff writer, New Yorker magazine, New York City, since 1957; columnist on jazz book, movie, theater and art reviewer, reporter.
(American Musicians, Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big ...)
( As jazz critic for The New Yorker magazine since 1957, ...)
( Jazz critic for The New Yorker since 1957 and the autho...)
(3rd collection of profiles of musicians, reviews, "apprec...)
(Whitney Balliett's new book contains many of the shorter ...)
(Whitney Balliett, jazz critic for The New Yorker for more...)
(These are selections from Balliett's jazz criticism and r...)
( These are selections from Balliett's jazz criticism and...)
(When Whitney Balliett's American Musicians appeared in th...)
("Whitney Balliett is, without a rival in sight, the most ...)
(The magic of improvisation was what Whitney Balliett call...)
(A journal of events in jazz in New York during the years ...)
( Renowned jazz critic Whitney Balliett loves New York. A...)
(Alec Wilder and His Friends The Words and Sounds of... By...)
(This is Whitney Balliett's long-awaited "big book." In it...)
(1966 First Printing by Whitney Balliet. 49 pieces of Jazz.)
(Subsequent)
(Hardcover. 8vo. Black cloth in dust jacket. First edition...)
(1st)
Served as sergeant United States Army Air Force, 1946-1947. Member Century Association.
Married Elizabeth Hurley King, 1951. Children: Julia, Elizabeth, Will. Married Nancy Kraemer, 1965.
Children: Whitney, Jamie.