Research > Guides > American Music Traditions: African American Music
American Music Traditions:
African American Music: Books
The following books are available at Central Library, as well as neighborhood libraries. If you are interested in a book that is currently checked out, place a hold to reserve a copy.
- Duke Ellington
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"I like any and all of my associations with music - writing, playing, and listening. We write and play from our perspective, and the audience listens from its perspective. If and when we agree, I am lucky."
By the time of his passing, he was considered amongst the world’s greatest composers and musicians. The French government honored him with their highest award, the Legion of Honor, while the government of the United States bestowed upon him the highest civil honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. -
He played for the royalty and for the common people and by the end of his 50-year career, he had played over 20,000 performances worldwide. He was The Duke, Duke Ellington.
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- quoted from dukeellington.com
Biographies:
Albertson, Chris-
782.421643 S643a 2003Considered by many to be the greatest blues singer of all time, Bessie Smith was also a successful vaudeville entertainer who became the highest-paid African American performer of the roaring twenties. This book is a revised and expanded edition of the classic biography of this extraordinary artist. - from the bookcover to Bessie.
Bailey, Pearl-
782.42164 B155b"Many things happen in one's lifetime. I've already written several books, but I haven't said it all. This whole book is intended as nothing more than an informal exchange between friends." - from the Prologue to Between You and Me.
Berlin, Edward A.-
780.92 J81bBerlin paints a vivid picture of the ragtime years, placing Scott Joplin's story in its historical context.
Brown, James-
782.421644 B878i 2005The consumate performer here talks about his music, life, and, in particular, the path of his career through racially charged times in the United States. The introduction by Marc Eliot is an excellent addition that helps put Brown's thoughts in the context of the past half century.
Congress,
Richard-
782.421643 R119c 2001There can be little doubt about the importance of James "Yank" Rachell in the history of the blues. His is one of only two major blues mandolinists and the only one to carry that instrument to any degree into the blues revival scene from the 1960's onward. Rachell's story is rich in musical associations, and it reveals for the first time at some length the workings of the blues scene in West Tennessee outside the city of Memphis. -from the preface, written by David Evans. Richard Congress is the owner of Random Chance Records, a record company based in New York City.
Danchin, Sebastian-
782.421643 H784d 2001Second cousin to now-famous bluesman John Lee Hooker, Earl Hooker was born in Mississippi in 1929 and was reared in black South Side Chicago, where his parents settled in 1930. He was a "musician's musician," defining the art of blues slide guitar and playing with such greats as Muddy Waters, Junior Wells, and B. B. King.
King,
B. B. with David Ritz-
782.421643 K52bThis is a blues story. The blues are a simple music; and I'm a simple man. But the blues aren't a science; the blues can't be broken down like mathematics. The blues are a mystery, and mysteries are never as simple as they look. - from the preface by B.B. King.
Leur, Walter van de-
781.65 S913L 2002A fascinating account of Billy Strayhorn, that combines biography and music analysis of the jazz collaborations of Strayhorn and Duke Ellington, illustrated with images of Strayhorn's own compositions. The author, Walter van de Leur, was the founder and editor of Billy Strayhorn Manuscript Editions. An inventory of all of Strayhorn's compositions and arrangements, both that he wrote and recorded, round out this well-written book.
Lipscomb, Mance-
I Say Me For a Parable: The Oral Autobiography of Mance Lipscomb, Texas Bluesman as told to and compiled by Glen Alyn.782.421643 L767i"I say me for a parable" means, roughly, "I use myself as an example." In this book Mance tells his own story in his own authentic language, as a representative of a hard yet rich way of rural African American life and as a creator and purveyor of a music that has conquered the globe. " - from I Say Me For a Parable.
Love, Dennis and Stacy Brown-
B Ha216L 2002The story of Lula Hardaway, born in a sharecropper's shack in Alabama. Hardaway was born Jan. 11, 1930, to a sharecropper in Eufaula, Ala. Her life was marked by poverty and abuse, according to interviews she gave for this biography. She eventually fled to Detroit, divorced and got work. It was in Detroit that her blind 10-year-old son, Stevie, began singing on street corners. His talent caught the eye of Motown Records founder Berry Gordy Jr., who signed him to a record contract and nicknamed him Little Stevie Wonder." - from an obituary of Lula Hardaway published in USA Today.
Mingus,
Sue-
781.65 M664m 2002In Tonight at Noon, Sue Graham Mingus gives us an elegant and unsparingly honest memoir of a romance between American opposites: she, a product of privilege, a former midwestern WASP debutante and Smith College graduate who worked as a journalist in Europe and in New York; he, an authentic jazz titan, a brilliant, eccentric, difficult artist, a scion of Watts, Los Angeles, who would become one of America's foremost composers. - from the book jacket.
Pastras, Philip-
781.65 M889p 2001Pastras offers a fresh interpretation of the life and work of Morton, one of the most important and influential early practitioners of jazz. While writing the book, Pastras discoverd a 58-page scrapbook compiled by Morton himself, quoted in this book. - from the book summary.
- Sacks, Howard L. and Judith Rose Sacks
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780.92 S674sHoward Sacks and Judith Rose Sacks trace this song to a nineteenth-century black family on the Ohio frontier and tell how the words, verse for verse, speak of African American experiences in the North, and a black woman's memories of her life in the slaveholding South.
White, Timothy-
782.42164 M347w 2006In the quarter century since his death, Bob Marley's stature as reggae superstar and pop culture icon has only grown. Timothy White updated his definitive biography over ....edit. - from the cover of Catch a Fire.
Zinsser, William-
781.65 M681z 2000Mitchell realizes as a young man that the piano is his destiny. His whole life becomes a search for what will make him a better artist. The same is true of Willie Ruff. He goes whereever he needs to go to learn what he wants to know next: to Yale to study with Paul Hindemith, to Africa to study the drum language of the Pygmies, to St. Mark's church in Venice to listen for "a distant sound." - from the foreword to Mitchell & Ruff.
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Music History Surveys:
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Louisiana State University Press [1973]780.973 S296a
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Viking Press [1974]784.7 J77b
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Rutgers University Press, c1988784.53 H318b
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Crescent Books, c1997Oversize 781.643 H318b 1997
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Cooper Square Press, 1999781.643 B658 1999
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Pantheon Books, c1998782.421643 D261b 1998
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Vincent Oxford University Press, 1973780.973 B928b
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Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2000New Books Popular Library 782.42162 J91w 2000
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University of Illinois Press, c1990782.421643 D749 1990
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Greenwood Press, 1988781.6296 F295
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Harvard University Press, 2003781.65 S256f 2003
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Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2002Humanities South Room, Central Library R-780.8996 W179f 2002 (This is a reference book - library use only)
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Elliott and Clark Pub., c1994781.64089 B258f
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Clarkson Potter, 1998782.25 N554g 1998
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Three Rivers Press, c2001782.421649 H667 2001
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University of Nebraska Press, c2001782.254 R287i 2001
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Garland Pub., c2000780.8996 S727i 2000
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1st ed. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, c2004781.71 C841i 2004
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Includes an appendix of Caribbean and South American recordings.Urbana: University of Illinois Press, c2004781.64089 B873L 2004
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Athens, Ga.: Hill Street Press, c2002781.64 M985
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Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, c2002
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New York: Continuum, 2004
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Oak Publications [1963]784.7 C48p
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San Diego: Greenhaven Press, c2003
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1st ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
781.66 R588 2004 -
New rev. ed. Rhinebeck, N.Y.: Mill Road Enterprises, 2003792.09747 F794s 2003
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University of Illinois Press, c1977784.7 E64s
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University of Pennsylvania Press, c1991783.1 A428s
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London ; New York : Continuum, 2004782.421643 R572t 2004
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St. Martin's Press, 1985784.55 G348w
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Smithsonian Institution Press, c1992782.254 W447
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Garland, 1995781.6296 S225w
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