100 Books Like Jelly Roll, Bix, and Hoagy

This jive-tongued jazz cat really knows how to use language! His use of slang is evidenced by the ten-page glossary at the end of the book. Raw and gritty, Mezzrow’s memoir describes how he learned to play jazz and blues in a juvenile reformatory, where he developed his love for the Black “race” and its culture. He often riffs on race. In 1920s Chicago he rubbed elbows with Black and White jazz luminaries, plus gangsters, prostitutes, and drug dealers. During a side trip to Paris, France, he spread the gospel of jazz to Europe. In the 30s he lived in New York City’s Harlem, inhabiting a milieu similar to that in Chicago, peddling marijuana to jazz greats and others. His extraordinary writing inspired Jack Kerouac and the Beat writers.

I highly value Condon’s ability to describe the daily anxiety and desperation of the poor jazz musicians, who constantly struggled to find work and pay the rent. He does so with great good humor. He tells a good story and he’s got a million of them, including a few about gangsters, but mostly about the many great jazz musicians like Bix Beiderbecke, whom he worked with and knew well. His many terse stories prove that brevity is the soul of wit. His dialogue is worthy of Ben Hecht—he’s good at wisecracks. I was sorry when the book came to an end.

I have so many reasons why this is one of my all-time favorite books. Berton’s descriptions of music, specifically jazz or music in general, are superb. Ralph Berton describes himself as a precocious 13-year-old (an understatement!), when in 1924 he meets Bix Beiderbecke, seven years his senior, and idolizes him. This relationship is a great part of the book’s charm. The Berton family—with its vaudeville background, two famous musical brothers (besides the child genius Ralph), and a Jewish mother—is another part of the appeal. But the heart of the book is his affectionate, penetrating portrait of Bix, derived from personal experience. He examines the myths and legends, sometimes debunking and sometimes reinforcing them. A magical, bittersweet book that often brought me to tears. Exceptional writing.

This book helped me understand the lives of young male jazz musicians in the early 20th century. A wacky, ecstatic, fragmented, kaleidoscopic, memoir—nostalgic always for Bloomington, Indiana, and his college days in the early 1920s. There Carmichael met his pals Monk and Bix, both of whom died too young. He dedicates the book to them and remembers them fondly. Monk, a surrealistic poet, and Bix, a great musical genius, they understood each other immediately. Bix responded to one of Monk’s poems saying, “I am not a swan.” There is a Dadaist flavor to Monk’s writing, as well as some of Hoagy’s: “The years had pants.” Intertwined with these memories is the slow, jerky progress of Carmichael’s journey from a would-be composer to a famous songwriter.

I love the simplicity of this book. I recommend it to clients who have a hard time being assertive. The book gives straightfoward, no nonsense input on how to handle a variety of challenging situations in a way which is both self-protective and likely to enable the reader to get a favourable outcome. Situations include how to say no without alienating the other person; asking in a way which makes it likely you’ll get what you want; and dealing with putdowns or unjust criticism.

A wonderful overview of the early years of Olivia Records, this memoir from the social justice warrior of the original Olivia collective details how the first lesbian recording company was founded—and succeeded, despite all odds. Berson includes romantic insights on the artists’ passion for one another, as well as accounts of building a national audience. For two generations of women who came out with this music, the songs and albums remain critical anthems of female empowerment—and the only music that existed to affirm lesbians’ lives.

The record industry was at its compact-disc-era peak in the late 1990s, when a tech firm called Napster went into business. A file-sharing service, Napster allowed listeners to trade digital versions of songs online for free.

The record industry ignored it at first and then tried to fight it before giving in and offering its music for purchase as online downloads, but it was too late. The genie was out of the bottle, and label revenue plunged by more than half. There were some grim years before online streaming took hold, which boosted the record industry to its highest peak ever in the 2020s.

By then, Rounder was no longer an independent label – sold to the Concord Music Group. It exists to this day, but on a more modest scale than before.

Commander Cody made that album for Warner Brothers Records during the time when the U.S. record business was grossing over a billion dollars a year.

During those heady days, no label group better exemplified the positive side of the industry than Warner, which stood as proof that you really could have profits with honor. From Frank Sinatra to Madonna, Warner put out music that generated sales and critical acclaim in equal measure.

Stan Cornyn was an executive at Warner for 34 years, overseeing countless publicity campaigns, and this delicious memoir evokes the industry’s glory days in the prestige penthouse. If Rounder was the cream of the independent-label crop, Warner was top of the major-label heap.

Something I didn’t realize as a young musician but quickly learned is that it’s called the business of music, and you need to spend as much time on the business side as the music side.

They call this book the music industry bible, and I agree—in its 11th edition, it’s up to date with the latest opportunities and challenges in music (streaming, various platforms). Great music can’t just live on your desk or computer; it needs to get out into the world to fulfill its function: emotionally connecting people. 

Phil Ramone has been involved in producing records for some of the biggest acts in music, including Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, and Paul Simon. Ostensibly, his book is about record production, but really it’s about people. Yes, Ramone worked with some big names over the course of his long career, but at the end of the day (as he emphasizes throughout the book), they’re all human beings, and while some degree of technical expertise is necessary when it comes to making music, what really matters is knowing how to talk to people. At the end of the day, making music is all about making human connections.