Uncompromising Expression by Richard Havers (Chronicle Books, 400 pages) $105
The story of Blue Note records is layered with war and discrimination on one hand and brilliance and daring on the other.
Berlin in the 1920s was the centre of jazz in Europe. The city was alive with innovative music and for teenagers Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff it was the foundation for their love of jazz. As Germany fell under the control of the Nazi party the music left and established New York as the best place in the world for jazz. Lion was the first to make New York his new home and from there he helped his friend Wolff make the journey from Germany.
The end of prohibition brought more people into nightclubs and the invention of the jukebox created a thirst for more records, which artists now recognized as an important means to reach bigger audiences. Passionate about jazz, Alfred Lion started his own record company and in 1939 Blue Note released its first two records, one each by pianists Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis.
From those early recordings Blue Note carved out a place in the music business with its exceptional jazz recordings. A forced closure during the Second World War due to the war effort did not deter its reemergence in 1943. The decades are divided into chapters and the evolution of the label and of jazz is presented through the artists and the recordings they made.
The history of the label is thoroughly documented by Havers with fabulous attention to detail. Not only are the recording artists featured but there is also plenty of information on who accompanied them, their backgrounds, the clubs they performed in and much more. Hundreds of photographs are included, showing live performances, backstage pictures, photo sessions, as well as posters and album covers.
