Reviews for Hard bop

The average rating for Hard bop based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2017-12-10 00:00:00 Mikhail Prokhin I read this years ago and am reviewing strictly on memory. Hard Bop is a book about a type of music which isn't my favorite. (I find that I have to work to listen past the hard bop format in order to appreciate the individuality of the musicians.) Having said that, David Rosenthal wrote a book that got me to listen to some music I might not have listened to, and to listen more closely when I did listen. I thank him for that. Mr. Rosenthal also introduced me to Harvey Pekar's American Splendor with his review of the first anthology in The N.Y. Times. He deserves my thanks for that too.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-06-28 00:00:00 Bob Baron Despite the inevitable and inescapable limitations that the sheer scale of the project has built-in, Hard Bop is a pretty damn awesome exercise in at least partially attaining its ambitions: a history of, yes, hard bop. What is that, you might ask? Basically anything issued on Blue Note records between the above years. How else can we qualify it? Does jazz invoke for you smoke, dimness, addiction, rebellion, inherent angst, and fucking awesome wailing and blowing? That's probably hard bop then. The lost-forever expanse between bop/swing and the freaky-deaky explorations of free jazz, hard bop was a multitudinous, mutinous thing. Formulated by an expanse of mostly black musicians who were born in the first quarter of the 20th century and who drew on gospel, soul, and blues traditions AND who were pissed off at the world, this kind of jazz can't be without attraction. Rosenthal was a encyclopedic and well-versed jazz fan and his enthusiasm and giddiness shines throughout. The only drawback is what I mentioned at the outset: there's so many aspects to cover, so many musicians to discuss that the book can't help but be minimally inadequate. But as a starter, it's just great.