Hardcover. San Francisco, Panjandrum/Aris Books, 1st, April 1978, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 251 pages plus index, b&w photographs. Light edge wear, rubbing to dust jacket. Else a clean, tight copy.

Softcover. NY, Billboard Books, reprint, 2004, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 352 pages, b&w illustrations. Presents an in-depth exploration of the musician's controversial electric period and the impact it had on the jazz community, as drawn from firsthand recollections about his artistic and personal life. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New Rochelle, Arlington House, 1st, 1972, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 554 pages. Illustrated with black & white photographs. Moderate foxing to edges. An important reference book on this legend of the big band era. Clean, tight copy.

Hardcover. NY, Harcourt, Brace & World, 1st, 1964, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket. This is Brigit Brophy's original 1964 edition (she later revisited it in 1988) of her profoundly original and controversial psychoanalytic study of Mozart's five most famous operas. 328 pages, clean copy.

Hardcover. London , Jazz Book Club/ Andre Deutsch, reprint, 1963, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 242 pages, in a very good dust jacket.

Hardcover. NY, Viking, 1st, 2023, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 970 pages illustrated with color, b&w illustrations. Barbra Streisand is by any account a living legend, a woman who in a career spanning six decades has excelled in every area of entertainment. She is among the handful of EGOT winners (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony) and has one of the greatest and most recognizable voices in the history of popular music. She has been nominated for a Grammy 46 times, and with Yentl she became the first woman to write, produce, direct, and star in a major motion picture. In My Name Is Barbra, she tells her own story about her life and extraordinary career, from growing up in Brooklyn to her first star-making appearances in New York nightclubs to her breakout performance in Funny Girl on stage and winning the Oscar for that performance on film. Then came a long string of successes in every medium in the years that followed. The book is, like Barbra herself, frank, funny, opinionated, and charming. She recounts her early struggles to become an actress, eventually turning to singing to earn a living; the recording of some of her acclaimed albums; the years of effort involved in making Yentl; her direction of The Prince of Tides; her friendships with figures ranging from Marlon Brando to Madeleine Albright; her political advocacy; and the fulfillment she's found in her marriage to James Brolin. Clean copy.

Softcover. NY, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, pbk proof, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 420 pages. Publishers uncorrected proof with flyer promoting the title laid in. The first major biography of the great jazz pianist and singer, written with the full cooperation of his family. When he died in 1965, at age forty-five, Nat King Cole was already a musical legend. As famous as Frank Sinatra, he had sold more records than anyone but Bing Crosby. Written with the narrative pacing of a novel, this absorbing biography traces Cole's rise to fame, from boy-wonder jazz genius to megastar in a racist society. Daniel Mark Epstein brings Cole and his times to vivid life: his precocious entrance onto the vibrant jazz scene of his hometown, Chicago; the creation of his trio and their rise to fame; the crossover success of such songs as "Straighten Up and Fly Right"; and his years as a pop singer and television star, the first African American to have his own show.Epstein examines Cole's insistence on changing society through his art rather than political activism, the romantic love story of Cole and Maria Ellington, and Cole's famous and influential image of calm, poise, and elegance, which concealed the personal turmoil and anxiety that undermined his health.

Hardcover. London, Reaktion Books, 1st, 2020, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, b&w photos. Ornette Coleman's career encompassed the glory years of jazz and the American avant-garde. Born in segregated Fort Worth, Texas, during the Great Depression, the African-American composer and musician was zeitgeist incarnate. Steeped in the Texas blues tradition, he and jazz grew up together, as the brassy blare of big band swing gave way to bebop--a faster music for a faster, postwar world. At the luminous dawn of the Space Age and New York's 1960s counterculture, Coleman gave voice to the moment. Lauded by some, maligned by many, he forged a breakaway art sometimes called "the new thing" or "free jazz." Featuring previously unpublished photographs of Coleman and his contemporaries, this book tells the compelling story of one of America's most adventurous musicians and the sound of a changing world. Clean copy.

Hardcover. UK, Cambridge University Press, 1st, 1983, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 492 pages, b&w photos. In a lightly worn dust jacket, clean copy. Otto Klemperer was one of the great conductors of the century, best known in the last years of his life for his performances and recordings of the classical symphonic repertory from Mozart to Mahler. Volume 1 only.

Hardcover. New York, Harper & Row, 1st, 1974, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 217 pages. Hardcover with price-clipped dust jacket. Clean, tight copy. Scarce biography of Robeson by Hamilton, a noted African-American children's book author.

NY, Knopf, 1st, 1988, Book: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Passionate and enormously talented, Paul Robeson lived one of the great lives of the twentieth century. Martin Duberman's classic biography is a monumental and powerfully affecting portrait of one of this century's most notable performers, political radicals, and champions of racial equality. Drawing on a vast archive of family papers and interviews with friends and relatives as well as FBI files, Paul Robeson charts the heroic and tragic course of Robeson's life: from his early days as the son of a former slave to his rise to unprecedented international acclaim as a stage actor and singer, and from his political awakening to his downfall as a victim of McCarthyism and the efforts of the U.S. government to destroy him. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New York, HarperCollins Publishers, 1st, 2011, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 242 pages. Hardcover. INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR. Gilt title on spine. Color illustrations throughout. From the front flap: "In Red, Sammy tells the outrageous story of his tear through rock 'n' roll, detailing the backstage antics and nonstop touring hat have made his voice instantly recognizable. Beginning with his musical coming-of-age in blue-collar towns of California, Sammy traces his rough and determined rise to fame, working harder than anyone else out there and writing songs about the things he loved--fast cars, loud parties, and lots of good times."

Hardcover. US, Harry N. Abrams, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 160 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket. a celebration of jazz legend Sonny Rollin's incredibly prolific career. This intimate appreciation in pictures and words combines the images of John Abbott, who was Rollin's photographer of choice for the past twernty years has captured the saxophonist at home and at work, and the essays of Bob Blumenthal, a jazz critic who has chronicled Rollins and his art for nearly four decades.

Hardcover. New York, Harry N. Abrams, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 160 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket. A celebration of jazz legend Sonny Rollin's incredibly prolific career. This intimate appreciation in pictures and words combines the images of John Abbott, who was Rollin's photographer of choice for the past twernty years has captured the saxophonist at home and at work, and the essays of Bob Blumenthal, a jazz critic who has chronicled Rollins and his art for nearly four decades.

Hardcover. London, Robert Hale, 1st UK, 1986, Hardcover, 254 pages, in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Biography of the nineteenth century composer, Franz Schubert (1797-1828). The author "corrects the legend that Schubert was a penniless, myopic roly-poly. This sympathetic and musically astute biography pays tribute to Schubert's raw talent and shows him to have been a composer of outstanding brilliance".

Hardcover. NY, Scribner, 1st, 2021, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. This intimate, revealing portrait of Frank Sinatra--from the man closest to the famous singer during the last decade of his life--features never-before-seen photos and new revelations about some of the most famous people of the past fifty years, including Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Sam Giancana, Madonna, and Bono.

Hardcover. NY, Little Brown, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. This is a biography of C.L. Franklin, one of the black preachers in American history. It tells the story of black migration and activism, alongside the rise of gospel, blues, and soul music, with a cast of characters including Martin Luther King, Jr., B.B. King, Art Tatum, and Coleman Young.

Hardcover. Berkeley, University of California Press, 3rd pr., 2018, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 279 pages, b&w photos. Sophisticated Giant presents the life and legacy of tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon (1923-1990), one of the major innovators of modern jazz. In a context of biography, history, and memoir, Maxine Gordon has completed the book that her late husband began, weaving his "solo" turns with her voice and a chorus of voices from past and present. Reading like a jazz composition, the blend of research, anecdote, and a selection of Dexter's personal letters reflects his colorful life and legendary times. It is clear why the celebrated trumpet genius Dizzy Gillespie said to Dexter, "Man, you ought to leave your karma to science." Clean copy.

Hardcover. San Rafael, CA, Insight Editions, 1st, 2009, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, SIGNED BY AUTHOR ON TITLE PAGE. 200 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. A very clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket edges. A tight copy. Over 200 photographs throughout. This stunning visual biography offers a rare look at Marley's personal life in Jamaica, as well as the exodus from his home country that culminated in his tragic death in 1981. Though it focused on Marley, Burnett's work also canvassed a wide array of up-and-coming reggae talents, providing striking early looks at Peter Tosh, Lee Scratch Perry, Burning Spear, and Ras Michael. Compelling and incomparably candid, Soul Rebel is a remarkable testament to the legacy of a legend.

Hardcover. NY, Simon and Schuster, 1st, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 608 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. A very clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket edges. Black and white photographs throughout. Music legend Clive Davis recounts an extraordinary five-decade career in the music business, while also telling a remarkable personal story of encounters with some of the greatest musical artists of our time, including Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin, Simon & Garfunkel, Barry Manilow, the Grateful Dead, Patti Smith, Whitney Houston, Carlos Santana, Dionne Warwick, Aretha Franklin, and Alicia Keys.

Hardcover. London, Canongate, 1st UK, 2017, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 547 pages, b&w illustrations. The story of Jann Wenner, Rolling Stone's founder, editor, and publisher, and the pioneering era he helped curate, is told here for the first time in glittering, glorious detail. Joe Hagan provides readers with a backstage pass to storied concert venues and rock-star hotel rooms; he tells never before heard stories about the lives of rock stars and their handlers; he details the daring journalism (Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, P.J. O'Rourke) and internecine office politics that accompanied the start-up; he animates the drug and sexual appetites of the era; and he reports on the politics of the last fifty years that were often chronicled in the pages of Rolling Stone magazine.

Hardcover. NY, WW Norton, 1st, 2004, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. A collection of articles, poems, essays, speeches, literary criticisms, and interviews about the 1960s musician and lyricist examines his legacy and role in the traditions of folk, rock, and blues, in a volume that includes contributions by such figures as Sam Shepard, Bruce Springsteen, and Johnny Cash.

Hardcover. NY, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1st, 1981, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover, 272 pages, b&w photos. Dust jacket with light edgewear, short tears,

Softcover. Baton Rouge, Louisiana State University , Revised Ed., 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 105 pages. Interviews with the jazz drummer, known for his wild style of drumming, who recounts his life and adventures playing with some of the best known jazz musicians and bands of his time. Includes additional reading and selected recordings. 6 leaves of b&w photo plates. Bright and clean, but with the light odor of a smoker-owned book.

Softcover. London, Castle Communications/Penguin, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, pictorial wraps, Fantastic collection of color & black & white photos with lots of info about the band. Contains color reproductions of psychedelic posters for The Doors concerts. Discography. Light chipping to paper spine, otherwise clean, very good.

Hardcover. Lunenburg VT, Stinehour Press, 1st, 1979, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, green cloth with gilt lettering and color label on front cover. 165 pages, b&w photos. Hildegarde Lasell was a concert singer. "Miss Lasell sang with refinement and cultivation," commented a reviewer in 1936, "she is obviously a serious student of the meaning and values of the music she interprets." She appeared in her husband's two short avant-garde films. She played Madeline Usher in the silent horror film The Fall of the House of Usher (1928),and Lot's wife in the Biblical adaptation Lot in Sodom (1933).In the 1950s, she persuaded composer Alec Wilder to write an original soundtrack for the 1928 film. Watson was vice-president of the Rochester (NY)Historical Society, and wrote the history of the society's Woodside mansion in 1962. She received a medal from the Rochester Museum and Science Center in 1972, alongside fellow recipients including Robert Jastrow, Roger Tory Peterson, and Yousuf Karsh. Her memoir, The Edge of the Woods: A Memoir (1979) was published posthumously. Some of her correspondence with poet Marianne Moore was also published posthumously. Limited to 1,000 copies. Clean.

Hardcover. NY, Mason/Charter, 1st, 1976, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 181 pages, b&w photos. The life story of the 1930's Hollywood superstar, who is still popular today. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Boston, The Boston Music Co., 1st, 1913, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, brown woven cloth with publisher's printed paper labels on spine and front cover. 247 pages, b&w photographs. Biography of an American composer with a strong family life. MOSTLY TOLD BY Nevin and his wife throughout. Nevin, 1862-1901, born in Edgewerth Pennsylvania; debut as pianist, Pittsburgh (Dec. 10, 1886); excelled in lyrical music, composing 70 songs, published in Sketch Book (1888), Water Scenes (1891), In Arcady (1892), May in Tuscany (1896), A Day in Venice (1898). INSCRIBED BY HIS WIFE on the title page with her calling card laid in. Clean, bight copy.

Hardcover. NY, Gotham Books, 1st, 2012, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 455 pages, b&w photos. The definitive biography of James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, with fascinating findings on his life as a Civil Rights activist, an entrepreneur, and the most innovative musician of our time. Playing 350 shows a year at his peak, with more than forty Billboard hits, James Brown was a dazzling showman who transformed American music. His life offstage was just as vibrant, and until now no biographer has delivered a complete profile. The One draws on interviews with more than 100 people who knew Brown personally or played with him professionally. Using these sources, award-winning writer RJ Smith draws a portrait of a man whose twisted and amazing life helps us to understand the music he made. The One delves deeply into the story of a man who was raised in abject-almost medieval-poverty in the segregated South but grew up to earn (and lose) several fortunes. Covering everything from Brown's unconventional childhood (his aunt ran a bordello), to his role in the Black Power movement, which used "Say It Loud (I'm Black and Proud)" as its anthem, to his high-profile friendships, to his complicated family life, Smith's meticulous research and sparkling prose blend biography with a cultural history of a pivotal era. Clean, bright copy.

Softcover. Portland OR, Amadeus Press, 1st US, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 504 pages. Essays about Purcell by scholars and performers, edited by Burden. -- Illustrated. Includes bibliography. Clean copy.

Softcover. Urbana, University of Illinois Press , 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 361 pages, b&w illustrations. The Stonemans is an eye-opening slice of Americana---a trip through nearly twenty years of country music history following a single family from their native Blue Ridge Mountains to the slums of Washington, D.C., and the glitter of Nashville. As early as 1924 Ernest V. "Pop" Stoneman realized the potential of what is now known as country music, and he tried to carve a career from it. Successful as a recording artist from 1925 through 1929, Stoneman foundered during the Great Depression. He, his wife, and their nine children went to Washington in 1932, struggling through a decade of hardship and working to revive the musical career Pop still believed in. The Stoneman Family won the Country Music Association's Vocal Group of the Year Award in 1967. After Pop's death a year later, some of the children scattered to pursue their own careers. Ivan Tribe relies on extensive interviews with the Stonemans and their friends in this chronicle of a family whose members have clung to their musical heritage through good times and bad.

Hardcover. NY, Dey St., 1st, 2021, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 376 pages, b&w illustrations. This book is divided into five main parts, with a total of 24 chapters. In the Introduction, Grohl describes an epiphany he had when he realized how he wanted to age: "I would celebrate the ensuing years by embracing the toll they'd take on me." He also explains that his memory is triggered by sound, and his recollections of the events in his life are mostly centered around songs, albums, and bands that he was apart of. Clean, like-new copy.

Hardcover. NY, Wiley, 2nd pr., 2001, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. The long-awaited, untold, inside story of the rise of the legendary actor, singer, scholar, and activist. The first volume of this major biography breaks new ground. The greatest scholar-athlete-performing artist in U.S. history, Paul Robeson was one of the most compelling figures of the twentieth century.Now his son, Paul Robeson Jr., traces the dramatic arc of his rise to fame, painting a definitive picture of Paul Robeson's formative years. His father was an escaped slave; his mother, a descendent of freedmen; and his wife, the brilliant and ambitious Eslanda Cardozo Goode. With a law degree from Columbia University; a professional football career; title roles in Eugene O'Neill's plays and in Shakespeare's Othello; and a concert career in America and Europe, Robeson dominated his era. 383 pages, b&w illustrations. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, W.W. Norton & Company, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 430 pages. During America's Swing Era, no musician was more successful or controversial than Artie Shaw: the charismatic and opinionated clarinetist-bandleader whose dozens of hits became anthems for "the greatest generation." But some of his most beautiful recordings were not issued until decades after he'd left the scene. He broke racial barriers by hiring African-American musicians. His frequent "retirements" earned him a reputation as the Hamlet of jazz. And he quit playing for good at the height of his powers. The handsome Shaw had seven wives (including Lana Turner and Ava Gardner). Inveterate reader and author of three books, he befriended the best-known writers of his time. Tom Nolan, who interviewed Shaw between 1990 and his death in 2004 and spoke with one hundred of his colleagues and contemporaries, captures Shaw and his era with candour and sympathy, bringing the master to vivid life and restoring him to his rightful place in jazz history. Clean, bright copy.

Hardcover. NY, Dutton, 1st, 2023, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. The mysterious true story of Connie Converse--a mid-century New York City songwriter, singer, and composer whose haunting music never found broad recognition--and one writer's quest to understand her life This is the mesmerizing story of an enigmatic life. When musician and New Yorker contributor Howard Fishman first heard Connie Converse's voice on a recording, he was convinced she could not be real. Her recordings were too good not to know, and too out of place for the 1950s to make sense--a singer who seemed to bridge the gap between traditional Americana (country, blues, folk, jazz, and gospel), the Great American Songbook, and the singer-songwriter movement that exploded a decade later with Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell. And then there was the bizarre legend about Connie Converse that had become the prevailing narrative of her life: that in 1974, at the age of fifty, she simply drove off one day and was never heard from again. Could this have been true? Who was Connie Converse, really?

Hardcover. NY, Dey Street Books/Morrow, 1st, 2024, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 437 pages. Celebrated NPR music critic Ann Powers explores the life and career of Joni Mitchell in a lyrical style as fascinating and ethereal as the songs of the artist herself. In Traveling, Powers seeks to understand Mitchell through her myriad journeys. Through extensive interviews with Mitchell's peers and deep archival research, she takes readers to rural Canada, mapping the singer's childhood battle with polio. She charts the course of Mitchell's musical evolution, ranging from early folk to jazz fusion to experimentation with pop synthetics. She follows the winding road of Mitchell's collaborations with other greats, and the loves that emerged along the way, all the way through to the remarkable return of Mitchell to music-making after the 2015 aneurysm that nearly took her life. Clean copy.

Softcover. NY, Da Capo Press, reprint, 1978, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 245 pages, b&w photos. Sidney Bechet (1897-1959) was one of the most brilliant exponents of New Orleans jazz. A prodigy on the clarinet, he soloed with Bunk Johnson's orchestra at age eleven, was improvising cornet-clarinet duos with Buddy Petit at age fifteen. Leaving New Orleans in the 1920s, Bechet took his Creole sound and spirit to New York, where he adopted the soprano saxophone and soon developed the unique style that marked his special artistry.

Hardcover. NY, Viking, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 191 pages illustrated in color and b&w. Profiles the popular musician, tracing his evolution as a singer from his childhood, through his early days as a blues singer with "Them," his solo career, and hits such as "Gloria" and "Moondance." Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, St. Martin's Press, 1st, 2009, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 448 pages, b&w photos. In a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Remainder dot on top edge, otherwise clean.

Softcover. Lake Front Editions, 1st, 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Memoirs of Vermont's own "Big" Joe Burrell with inscription by Big Joe on front fly leaf. Illustrated with photos in b&w. Light wear and rubbing to covers and spine, else a very nice, tight, clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Skira Rizzoli, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 224 pages. Illustrated in color and b&w. The most comprehensive book on the artist to date, offering an insightful look into the legendary musician and his enormous impact on the development of jazz. Miles Davis explores the life and art of one of the greatest visionaries in jazz history--through photographs, handwritten musical scores, album covers, posters, and more--cementing his reputation as the embodiment of cool, both on- and offstage. To examine his extraordinary career is also to examine the history of jazz from the mid-1940s through the early 1990s, as Davis was crucial in almost every important innovation and stylistic development during that time. His genius paved the way for these changes, both with his own performances and recordings, and by choosing collaborators with whom he forged new directions. Miles Davis--trumpeter, bandleader, and composer--was one of the most important figures in jazz history. He was born in a well-to-do family in St. Louis in 1926 and died in a Los Angeles hospital in 1991. He was at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including cool jazz, hard bop, free jazz, and fusion. Davis worked with many of the greatest jazz musicians of all time, including Ron Carter, John Coltrane, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Quincy Jones, Charlie Parker, and Max Roach, among numerous others.

Hardcover. NY, Knopf, 1st, 2001, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Woody Guthrie spent his life putting into words and music what the rest of America was thinking. He roamed from coast to coast and captured the despair of those displaced by the Great Depression and the dust bowl, eulogized workers, and celebrated the great natural beauty of America. This is an introductory biography presented as a picture book with a brief lyrical text and powerful, hand-tinted, woodcut-like illustrations by the author. It includes the complete lyrics to "This Land Is Your Land" and excerpts from his other songs.

Softcover. Ventura CA, Pathfinder Publishing, 1st, 1990, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 214 pages, b&w illustrations. The story of the career, music, and life of the man who made drums a solo instrument, symbolized the swing era, and is still internationally recognized as "the world's greatest drummer." Book was once owned by a smoker and has odor.