Good Morning Blues: The Autobiography of Count Basie

by Count Basie, Albert Murray (Editor)

Overview

Count Basie was one of America’s pre-eminent and influential jazz pianists, bandleaders, and composers, known for such classics as “Jumpin’ at the Woodside,” “Goin’ to Chicago Blues,” “Sent for You Yesterday and Here You Come Today,” and “One O’Clock Jump.” In Good Morning Blues, Basie recounts his life story to Albert Murray, from his childhood years playing ragtime with his own pickup band at dances and pig roasts, to his years in New York City in search of opportunity, to rollicking anecdotes of Basie’s encounters with Fats Waller, Frank Sinatra, Fred Astaire, Sammy Davis Jr., Quincy Jones, Billie Holliday, and Tony Bennett. In this classic of jazz autobiography that was ten years in the making, Albert Murray brings the voice of Count Basie to the printed page in what is both testimony and tribute to an incredibly rich life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781517901431
Publisher:	University of Minnesota Press
Publication date:	12/14/2016
Series:	PostHumanities
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	416
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 4.10(d)

About the Author

William James “Count” Basie (1904-84) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer.

Albert Murray (1916-2013), author of thirteen books including Stomping the Blues, was a renowned jazz historian, novelist, and social and cultural theorist. He cofounded Jazz at Lincoln Center in 1987. 

Dan Morgenstern is a jazz critic and Director Emeritus of the Institute for Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. He is the author of Jazz People (1976); and Living with Jazz (2004), a reader edited by Sheldon Meyer, both winners of ASCAP’s Deems Taylor Award. In 2007, he received the A.B. Spellman Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Table of Contents

Contents

Introduction to the New Edition
Dan Morgenstern

Preface

Part One: 1904-1951
The Blue Devils: 1927-1929
Red Bank and Thereabouts: 1904-Circa 1923
The Columbia Wheel: Circa 1924-Circa 1925
Harlem Stride Time: 1925-1926
TOBA: 1926-1927
Moten Swing Territory: 1929-1935
Three, Three, and Three at the Reno: 1935-1936
East to the Apple and The Woodside: 1936-1937
The Famous Door and the National Scene: 1938-1941
The Holy Main I: 1939-1941
The Holy Main II: 1942-1950

Part Two: 1951-1984
The Comeback: 1950-1954
Sixteen Men Swinging: 1954-1959
Stomping Grounds and Stopping Places: 1959-1964
One More Time and One More Once: 1964-1976
Ole Base Up to Now: 1976-1984

Afterword and Acknowledgments
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Good Morning Blues is a remarkable achievement . . . Mr. Murray is an excellent arranger for the Count, just as the Count was an excellent leader of his orchestra."—New York Times Book Review

"Good Morning Blues is packed with fine stories . . . told in a wry, sly prose that sounds for all the world like Basie himself at the keyboard . . . The book positively sparkles."—Washington Post

"Like Basie’s music, his as-told-to autobiography is decidedly upbeat and life-affirming."—Kirkus Reviews

"A classic in jazz literature."—Shepherd Express

"These are the words of a hero and deserve your attention."—Jazzwise Magazine

"One of the best-written and most engaging autobiographies of the past century."—The Syncopated Times

From the Publisher

Long before he thought about becoming a musician, William Basie, son of a Red Bank, N.J., coachman and caretaker, longed to ``go on the road touring everywhere in the world of show business with a troupe.'' In these long, rambling memoirs, skillfully put together from tape recordings, the Count recollects his experiences as a traveling pianist in Missouri and Oklahoma, as a member (with Hot Lips Page and Jimmie Rushing) of the Blue Devils, as organist in a silent-movie house, with Bennie Moten's orchestra in Kansas City, and as leader of one of the greatest jazz bands of all time. Basie pays tribute to his colleagues and managers (and to John Hammond for ``discovering'' him), but does not hesitate to discuss their weaknesses and shortcomings; his language is direct and earthy. Although some of the book reads more like a catalogue or itinerary than an autobiography, it will have strong appeal for jazz buffs and fans of the late bandleader. Photos not seen by PW. January 1

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Murray compiled this biography from conversations with Basie, who died in 1984. Basie is the narrator looking back at his first jobs playing piano in Red Bank, New Jersey; his performances with Bennie Moten's Orchestra in Kansas City; and his fame as a big band leader from the Thirties to the Eighties. Basie's entertaining memories of his early days of performing in movie theaters and sleeping in pool halls give a more colorful picture of life as a musician in the Thirties than would a conventional history or biography. His chronicle of later years of successful worldwide performances seems commonplace in comparison. Basie laughs at his own motives and foibles and reasonably and modestly assesses his talent in a colloquial style that makes this appealing portrait a valuable record of a personality and an age. William Brockman, Drew Univ. Lib., Madison, N.J.

Library Journal