The individualized, great-man theory is of limited use for understanding jazz on its own terms, yet it has long guided the way books about jazz are chosen for publication. But things have changed. Figures like Junior Cooksidemen, if you likehave been overlooked outside of musician and gig-goer circles. To take up these subjects is to meet jazz where it lives, unearthing valuable information not only about the lives of the musicians themselves but also about the stories of their milieu, including the tiny clubs they played in, their daily practices, who they listened to, how they shared knowledge, what they earned, what they read, what they thought. Neros book is evenhanded, generous, well-written, well-researched, and careful about facts. It is designed to be read by anyone interested in the subject, not just by musicians or specialists. - Ben Ratliff, former pop and jazz critic at The New York Times; clinical associate professor at New York University's Gallatin School of Individualized Study; and author of five books, including Coltrane: The Story of a Sound
The unique and triumphant virtue of this biographical reminiscence resides with its candid directness and sensitive understanding of both the jazz world and a truly stalwart, somewhat private, musician who dedicated himself to the business of making creative music undistracted by fame, glamor, and self-adulation. Im stunned to realize in retrospect how sad and genuinely unfair the whole of the jazz legacy would have been without this book. It rescues the truth and value of a significant jazz musician, unheralded to an unfortunate degree, whose legacy will endure as long as the grand jazz heritage lives. This text earns my deep respect. - Jim Merod, jazz and blues recording and mastering engineer and coauthor of Whisper Not:The Autobiography of Benny Golson
