Kevin Le Gendre – författare

Kevin Le Gendre brings his considerable knowledge and experience to The Philosophy of Jazz, interpreting the mindset, outlook and ambition of the jazz musician and a form of music that has captured the imagination of international audiences for over a century.This is not a straight history of this genre of music but an exploration of what it means to be a jazz musician and the alchemy between players and audience during a live-music session. While drawing on historical references, in terms of cultural touchstones in Black music and the Black experience, this fascinating book very much immerses itself in the current jazz scene and the interesting directions being explored. Along the way the greats of jazz are all covered Joplin, Morton, Billie, Miles and Monk along with their influence and legacy.

Although his activity as a recording artist spanned a period of just three years, from 1967, the year of his arrival in England from America to 1970, the year of his death, Jimi Hendrix created a body of work that has exerted a significant influence on a number of artists in the 20th century and beyond. A headline-grabbing, explosive performer, he is widely recognized as an innovative guitarist who broadened the vocabulary of his instrument through both his technique and daring use of technology. For several generations of critics and audiences, he remains the archetypal rock star who framed his immeasurable talent with lifestyle excesses inherent to his profession.Hear My Train A Comin' seeks to appraise Hendrix's legacy in different terms. His ability as a soloist is undeniable, but it is not necessarily the defining aspect of his genius. This book focuses on Hendrix the songwriter, a superlative storyteller who was able to combine melody, lyric and arrangement in order to create pieces that take pride of place in the pantheon of post-war popular music. Why do anthems such as Crosstown Traffic, The Wind Cries Mary, Little Wing, Voodoo Child [Slight Return] Purple Haze or Foxy Lady still affect us today? They alchemize word and sound.These are just a few examples of Hendrix crafting a composition in the most complete sense of the term, making judicious decisions with regard to mood, texture, contrast and overall orchestral richness, looking at his basic resource, the guitar-bass-drums set up as a unit to be enhanced by a range of other instruments and studio production.This book investigates the artist's immense creativity, and the intriguing relationship he had with the art of song, a platform for a multitude of ideas and improvisation.

Black British Music and the people who made it, from Tudor times to the mid '60s.This is a story of empire, colonialism and then the new energies released by the movements for freedom and independence of the post second-world-war years; of the movements of peoples across borders; of the flow of music around the triangle that takes in Africa, the Caribbean, the USA and Great Britain; of temporary but highly influential visitors like Paul Robeson; and of the settlement of ex-colonial peoples who brought their music to Britain, and changed its forms and concerns in the new context. It is the story of institutions like the military that provided spaces for black musicians, but it is also the story of individuals like John Blanke, the black trumpeter in the court of Henry VIII, Ignatius Sancho the composer and friend of Laurence Sterne in the 18th century, early nineteenth century street performers such as Joseph Johnson and Billy Waters, child prodigies such as George Bridgewater and composers such as Samuel Coleridge-Taylor in the later 19th whose music is still played today. Above all, it is the story of those individuals who changed the face of British music in the post-war period, who collectively fertilized British jazz, popular music and street theatre in ways that continue to evolve in the present.This is the story of the Windrush generation who brought calypso and steelband to Britain''s streets, Caribbean jazz musicians such as Joe Harriot and Shake Keane, or escapees from apartheid South Africa, such as Chris McGregor and Dudu Pukwana who brought modernity and the sounds of Soweto to British jazz, and a later generation who gave ska and reggae distinctive British accents. Based on extensive research and many first-hand interviews, one of the great virtues of Kevin Le Gendre''s book is lack of London-centricity, its recognition that much important development took place in cities such as Manchester, Leeds and Bristol. As a noted reviewer of black music for the BBC, the Independent, Echoes and other journals, Le Gendre brings together both a sense of historical purpose and the ability to actually describe music in vivid and meaningful ways.