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Title: Stardust Melodies by Will Friedwald ISBN: 0-375-42089-4 Publisher: Pantheon Books Pub. Date: 23 April, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.86 (14 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: More Fine Work From Friedwald
Comment: If you're an aficionado of the Great American Songbook, this is a must-buy. If you've read Friedwald's "The Song is You," you should already have this fine follow-up.
"Stardust Melodies" covers the origins and musical structure of some well-chosen standards. On the latter score, don't be intimidated if you don't read music; the analyses cover only a few pages and, frankly, it would be educational to read them while listening to the songs themselves.
Major recordings of the songs are then analyzed in the knowledgeable but witty and accessible style that endears Friedwald to his readers, and no one who has read any of his previous books will be disappointed. Perfect? No: the lack of discographies is a particularly glaring lapse, as noted by several reviewers. And, as others have also noted, Friedwald does have a blind spot when it comes to many more contemporary artists, but at least he wears his prejudices on his sleeve - he bluntly states, for instance, that he refuses to even listen to Johnnie Ray's recording of "As Time Goes By" (which happens to be excellent and, for Ray, quite restrained - WF might even like it!). This doesn't help his overall credibility with some readers, but for others Will's dislikes are part of the fun in reading him.
And that's the bottom line: this is a fun and informative book, not dry, stuffy or academic, reflecting the depth, variety and vitality of American pop. As the man said, Who could ask for anything more?
Rating: 2
Summary: Great subject, very disappointing book
Comment: What a great idea for a book, but unfortunately Mr. Friedwald lets it get away from him. It's not just that he can't resist his childish bashing of all music post-Sinatra. Mr. Friedwald's inability to appreciate the songwriting of the Beatles and Bob Dylan -- to name only the most obvious examples -- suggests a stunted development as a listener and a critic. But what really disappoints is the book's failure to work even on its own terms. A biography of a song? That would be wonderful -- but instead Friedwald gives us little more than an extended discography. This gives the book some value as a research tool, but it doesn't make for interesting or enlightening reading. And then there are all the missed opportunities. For instance, we learn that Hoagy Carmichael wrote an original set of lyrics for "Stardust" which were later replaced. Well, wouldn't a book like this one be the perfect place to reprint them? Mr. Friedwald doesn't seem to think so. Or take his chapter on "Mack the Knife." Many musicians are familiar with the fact that when Kurt Weill wrote the melody he was trying to write in the style of an American pop hit. And so he based the melody, and to some extent the chord changes, on a song which was then very popular but which has now been forgotten: "The Sheik of Araby." If you listen to "Sheik" and then to "Mack" -- you'll hear the similarities and you'll also see how Weill's imagination made the melody so much more haunting and beautiful. You'd think a book like Friedwald's would be the perfect place to tell this story of how "Mack the Knife" came into being. But there's not even a mention of it! I suppose Friedwald didn't know the story. Well he should have done some research! He doesn't do his subject justice. I guess he was too busy fuming about those miserable Beatles... By the way, if you want to read a really satisfying account of "the biography of a song," check out the book WHITE CHRISTMAS by Jody Rosen. It does what Friedwald's book fails to do.
Rating: 4
Summary: Hits and Misses
Comment: Will Friedwald probably deserves a medal for taking on this project, a 400-page analysis and performance history of twelve oft-recorded American lullabyes. Even some of us who swear by the Great American Songbook might opt for "I Can't Get No Satisfaction" if the alternative is listening to several hundred different versions of "Stardust" (as lovely as it is). Granted, a song biography has more going for it than, say, a performance history of Shakespeare's most popular plays, but still it's not exactly a compelling page turner.
Friedwald writes with hipness, esprit and engaging good humor, and he delivers provocative opinions, fascinating information, and a wealth of trivia. But the price of admission may be judged a bit excessive by some readers, mainly because the book contains no index, lists, or even discographies that would insure its value as a reference tool.
Every reader will no doubt find much to quibble about with a book such as this (admittedly no small part of its appeal). Frankly, I'm surprised the author makes no mention of the 1947 Lionel Hampton All-Star Concert recording of "Stardust" (with extraordinary solos by Charlie Shavers and Slam Stewart along with Hamp's introduction of the "Pretty Baby" motif, which Friedwald attributes to a later recording). And although a Paul Desmond version is mentioned, the Brubeck Quartet performance on the indispensable "Jazz at Oberlin" album (which evokes without stating the melody) is not. Finally, I'm surprised the author appears to accept "C" (as does Zinsser in his book) as the current standard key for the song. Any real musician I've known has balked at lowering the tune down half a step from the traditional Db, and for good reason: such a simplification drastically alters the character and feel of the piece, making stardust little more than prosaic morning dust.
No doubt no reader will be completely satisfied with the song selections--including this one. How can you possibly leave out as durable, beautiful, ingenious a tune as "All the Things You Are," especially given its many permutations? Which is simply to say that some of us would have preferred shorter chapters, more songs, and an index.
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