Moving to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life Summary and Reviews

Moving to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life
by Wynton Marsalis, Geoffrey Ward

Moving to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life
List Price: $26.00
Our Price: $12.99
You Save: $13.01 (50%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $9.99 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions


or

Book Summary Information

Author: Geoffrey Ward, Wynton Marsalis
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-09-02
ISBN: 1400060788
Number of pages: 208
Publisher: Random House

Book Reviews of Moving to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life

Book Review: Marsalis' pen really swings
Summary: 5 Stars

One of the happiest art-related occurrences for me in recent years has been my discovery of jazz. I've listened to a lot of it since then, and while I still can't say I really "get" jazz all that well, I'm starting to recognize the great and important players and composers, the standards, and -- maybe most important -- what I do and don't like. My reaction to this book by Wynton Marsalis and Geoffrey C. Ward is similar: I can't say I "get" it all, but I followed most of it, picked up its swing when I encountered it, and had a really good time with it. I recommend "Moving to Higher Ground" very highly.

Like in any complex jazz piece, there are a lot of different things going on in this book, so it's hard to describe. It's hard even to answer the obvious question "So how CAN jazz change my life?" Marsalis writes a lot about how jazz works, what's going on during a performance, what good players have to be able to do in order to swing together, and maybe most fundamentally, where jazz came from and why that matters. I felt fortunate to have what familiarity I do with a good percentage of the names, albums, and tunes he mentions -- I think it would be a lot harder for someone without any exposure to jazz to begin to process what Marsalis is saying. My list of things to find and listen to definitely got a lot longer because of what I read here.

Although Marsalis has, by his own telling, softened his tone from the angry young man he was 25 years ago, there's still a fair amount of opinion and criticism in these pages, as well as jokes directed at, particularly, tenor sax-men, bass players, and drummers. He also doesn't have much good to say about hip-hop, the musical chops of rock bands, or the disregard paid to jazz, not only by the culture at large, but particularly by the African-American community. As you might expect, there is a lot of discussion of racial issues in these pages -- but you might be surprised, as I was, by the convincing passion with which Marsalis argues that at its finest (and here IS a partial answer to the question of how jazz can change your life), jazz transcends race ... drawing from the African-American blues idiom but speaking to the universal human experience of pain, longing, overcoming, and triumph. It's an inspirational message.

Some of the other lessons are more fundamental: discover your voice, but know how to use it in community; honor your elders and build on the work they did, instead of ignoring the past in your drive to invent the future in your own image; and, at the risk of sounding like a Nike commercial, don't do it for the money, do it for the love. This book says a lot about music, about creativity, about relationships, and about jazz's solid claim to be America's greatest indigenous art form. That's a lot to pack into one book, but Wynton Marsalis -- and of course Geoffrey C. Ward, whose young-FDR books I also much admire -- are more than up to the task. This book swings, and it takes you along with it.

Biographies & Memoirs Books

Book Subjects
Most talked about in Biographies & Memoirs Books
The Girls from Ames: A Story of Women and a Forty-Year Friendship ImageThe Girls from Ames: A Story of Women and a Forty-Year Friendship
by Jeffrey Zaslow
Gotham; Published: 2009-04-21; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.60
Price in other shops: $26.00
A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity ImageA Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity
by Bill O'Reilly
Broadway; Published: 2008-09-23; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.90
Price in other shops: $26.00
The Last Lecture ImageThe Last Lecture
by Randy Pausch, Jeffrey Zaslow
Hyperion; Published: 2008-04-08; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $8.40
Price in other shops: $21.95
Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 ImageLone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10
by Marcus Luttrell
Little, Brown and Company; Published: 2009-05-01; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.56
Price in other shops: $8.99
Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist ImageAlways Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist
by Michael J. Fox
Hyperion; Published: 2009-03-31; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.00
Price in other shops: $25.99
Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time ImageThree Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time
by Greg Mortenson, David Oliver Relin
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2007-01-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.50
Price in other shops: $15.00
Much to Your Chagrin: A Memoir of Embarrassment ImageMuch to Your Chagrin: A Memoir of Embarrassment
by Suzanne Guillette
Atria; Published: 2009-03-10; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $7.25
Price in other shops: $25.00
Taking Woodstock ImageTaking Woodstock
by Elliot Tiber, Tom Monte
Square One Publishers; Published: 2007-06-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $14.69
Price in other shops: $24.95
The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano ImageThe Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano
Coffeetown Press; Published: 2008-10-01; Paperback; Book
Price in other shops: $19.95
A Lion Called Christian: The True Story of the Remarkable Bond between Two Friends and a Lion ImageA Lion Called Christian: The True Story of the Remarkable Bond between Two Friends and a Lion
by Anthony Bourke, John Rendall
Broadway; Published: 2009-03-10; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.76
Price in other shops: $21.95
Similar books summaries and other product reviews
Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Revised and Expanded Edition ImageMusicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Revised and Expanded Edition
by Oliver Sacks
Vintage; Published: 2008-09-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.24
Price in other shops: $14.95
Marsalis on Music ImageMarsalis on Music
by Wynton Marsalis
W.W. Norton & Co.; Published: 1995-10-17; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $2.24
Price in other shops: $29.95
A Mercy ImageA Mercy
by Toni Morrison
Knopf; Published: 2008-11-11; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.00
Price in other shops: $23.95
Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America ImageHot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America
by Thomas L. Friedman
Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Published: 2008-09-08; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.99
Price in other shops: $27.95
Plays Duke Ellington ImageThelonious Monk - Plays Duke Ellington
Release date: 2007-03-27; Music CD
Best price: $6.88
Price in other shops: $11.98
The Jazz Ear: Conversations over Music ImageThe Jazz Ear: Conversations over Music
by Ben Ratliff
Times Books; Published: 2008-11-11; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $14.63
Price in other shops: $25.00
Outliers: The Story of Success ImageOutliers: The Story of Success
by Malcolm Gladwell
Little, Brown and Company; Published: 2008-11-18; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.93
Price in other shops: $27.99
Standards & Ballads ImageWynton Marsalis - Standards & Ballads
Release date: 2008-01-22; Music CD
Best price: $9.57
Price in other shops: $13.98
To a Young Jazz Musician: Letters from the Road ImageTo a Young Jazz Musician: Letters from the Road
by Wynton Marsalis, Selwyn Seyfu Hinds
Random House Trade Paperbacks; Published: 2005-11-08; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.35
Price in other shops: $12.95
Two Men With The Blues ImageWillie Nelson/Wynton Marsalis - Two Men With The Blues
Release date: 2008-07-08; Music CD
Best price: $5.63
Price in other shops: $18.98