The Story of the Saxophone

by Lesa Cline-Ransome, James E. Ransome (Illustrator)

Overview

Brassy, smokey, melodious. There's nothing like the saxophone. This incredible work from the award-winners behind Before She was Harriet includes a poster of jazz music's greatest talents.

You may think that the story of the saxophone begins with Dexter Gordon or Charlie Parker, or on a street corner in New Orleans. It really began in 1840 in Belgium with a young daydreamer named Joseph-Antoine Adolphe Sax—a boy with bad luck but great ideas.

Coretta Scott King Honoree Lesa Cline-Ransome unravels the fascinating history of how Adolphe's once reviled instrument was transported across Europe and Mexico to New Orleans. Follow the saxophone's journey from Adolphe's imagination to the pawn shop window where it caught the eye of musician Sidney Bechet and became the iconic symbol of jazz music it is today.

Deflty retold, this history is paired with the gorgeous artwork of James E. Ransome, including an attention-grabbing poster of iconic jazz musicians you can find inside the jacket.

A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780823437023
Publisher:	Holiday House
Publication date:	03/28/2023
Pages:	40
Sales rank:	243,244
Product dimensions:	11.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	6 - 9 Years

About the Author

Lesa Cline-Ransome is the author of more than twenty books for young readers including the award-winning Finding Langston trilogy. Her work has received a plethora of honors, including dozens of starred reviews, NAACP Image Award nominations, a Coretta Scott King honor, the Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction and a Christopher Award. Her work has been named to ALA Notable Books and Bank Street Best Children’s Book lists and she lives in the Hudson Valley region of New York.

James E. Ransome's has illustrated many award-winning books for children. His numerous accolades include a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award for The Creation; a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor for The Bell Rang, Before She was Harriet, and Uncle Jed's Barbershop; and an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Let My People Go. He lives in upstate New York.

Editorial Reviews

★ 02/06/2023

A young visionary introduces a new musical sound to the world in an underdog story pulled from lesser-known music history. In early 19th-century Belgium, often bored Joseph-Antoine Adolphe Sax (1814–1894) works at his father’s instrument shop, playing “nearly every instrument you can imagine,” and inventing new ones, including the sax trombone and the flugelhorn. “Daydreaming of a new sound” and assembling “one crazy contraption after the next,” Sax finally finds a unique sound between a trumpet and clarinet: the saxophon. Sax’s instrument causes an uproar, admired by classical music icon Hector Berlioz, rejected by Parisian traditionalists, and labeled by others as a “devil’s horn.” Only after Sax’s death did American musicians such as Sidney Bechet, Charlie Parker, and Dexter Gordon elevate Sax’s controversial invention into an essential part of jazz expression. Cline-Ransome invites readers’ empathy through clearly established stakes as Sax triumphs over critics, while Ransome’s initially muted cityscapes give way to vibrant celebrations of band music, and end-paper portraits celebrate a diverse array of saxophonists. Ages 6–9. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

2022-12-14
This collaboration spotlights the saxophone’s European birth and wide adoption by American jazz musicians.

Adolphe Sax, a 19th-century Belgian instrument maker’s son, both plays and invents instruments. Searching for a new sound—softer than a trumpet, louder than a clarinet—Adolphe tinkers and reassembles until his masterpiece is ready. Belgium’s arbiters reject the new instrument, and Adolphe moves to Paris. While French tastemakers initially pan it, the composer Hector Berlioz champions “le saxophon,” opining, “It cries, sighs, and dreams.” After hard-won integration into French military bands, other European nations adopt it, too. Napoleon III loses France’s war in Mexico accompanied by the instrument’s wails. Florencio Ramos, a musician in a Mexican cavalry band, obtains a sax and settles in New Orleans in 1884. The signature sound of the rechristened “saxophone” spreads there and beyond, inseparable from jazz’s early permutations. (Cline-Ransome avers that after Sidney Bechet picks up the sax, he forsakes his clarinet.) A final spread summarizes jazz’s singular predisposition to musical contagion: “Coleman Hawkins heard Sidney play. / And Lester Young heard Coleman play. / And Charlie Parker heard Lester play.” While the anecdotal narrative adroitly portrays Sax’s perseverance as an innovator, the segue to American jazz gets shorter shrift. Cline-Ransome admirably amends this: Endpapers, a jacket poster, and spot illustrations celebrate over 20 diverse saxophone greats. Rich, sepia-toned spreads showcase the saxophone’s shining complexity.

Engagingly links the jazz saxophone with its European roots. (Informational picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus Reviews

★ "The well-established author-illustrator team achieves a strong, unified vision."—School Library Journal, Starred Review

★ "A now-essential piece of reading for music lovers. . . Ransome's detailed, relaxed line captures historical periods with precision and vibrancy, and his illustrations of the jazz musicians who made the instrument famous are especially striking. It's a biography whose warm, mellow tone matches that of the instrument itself."—Shelf Awareness, Starred Review

★  "Cline-Ransome invites readers' empathy through clearly established stakes as Sax triumphs over critics, while Ransome's initially muted cityscapes give way to vibrant celebrations of band music, and end-paper portraits celebrate a diverse array of saxophonists."—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"Richly detailed, wonderfully expressive illustrations complement the text perfectly. . . . A satisfying story of a persistent, creative genius. Readers will almost be able to hear soft saxophone music playing in the background."—Booklist

"Engagingly links the jazz saxophone with its European roots."—Kirkus Reviews

"Ransome's illustrations shine with careful detail. . . ."—The Horn Book

From the Publisher