Music lovers have been attracted to the distinct style and sleek sound of jazz since its birth at the turn of the century. The album covers collected in this comprehensive volume under the well-known Blue Note record label embody classic design and pioneering typography. Two hundred color photographs of the album sleeves, an informative history of the Blue Note record company, and a portrait of Reid Miles, who designed nearly 500 album covers, capture the integrity of this distinctive record label. Sophisticated jazz connoisseurs and young listeners alike, as well as those with an interest in style and graphic design, will enjoy this exciting book of jazz memorabilia.

"Can preaching recover a Blues sensibility and dare speak with authority in the midst of tragedy? America is living stormy Monday, but the pulpit is preaching happy Sunday. The world is experiencing the Blues, and pulpiteers are dispensing excessive doses of non-prescribed prosaic sermons with severe ecclesiastical and theological side effects." â€"from chapter 1 Uniquely gifted preacher Otis Moss III helps preachers effectively communicate hope in a desperate and difficult world in this new work based on his 2014 Yale Lyman Beecher Lectures. Moss challenges preachers to preach with a "Blue Note sensibility," which speaks directly to the tragedies faced by their congregants without falling into despair. He then offers four powerful sermons that illustrate his Blue Note preaching style. In them, Moss beautifully and passionately brings to life biblical characters that speak to today's pressing issues, including race discrimination and police brutality, while maintaining a strong message of hope. Moss shows how preachers can teach their congregations to resist letting the darkness find its way into them and, instead, learn to dance in the dark.

Jazz can be uplifting, stimulating, sensual, and spiritual. Yet when writers turn to this form of music, they almost always imagine it in terms of loneliness. In Blue Notes: Jazz, Literature, and Loneliness, Sam V. H. Reese investigates literary representations of jazz and the cultural narratives often associated with it, noting how they have, in turn, shaped readers’ judgments and assumptions about the music. This illuminating critical study contemplates the relationship between jazz and literature from a perspective that musicians themselves regularly call upon to characterize their performances: that of the conversation. Reese traces the tradition of literary appropriations of jazz, both as subject matter and as aesthetic structure, in order to show how writers turn to this genre of music as an avenue for exploring aspects of human loneliness. In turn, jazz musicians have often looked to literature—sometimes obliquely, sometimes centrally—for inspiration. Reese devotes particular attention to how several revolutionary jazz artists used the written word as a way to express, in concrete terms, something their music could only allude to or affectively evoke. By analyzing these exchanges between music and literature, Blue Notes refines and expands the cultural meaning of being alone, stressing how loneliness can create beauty, empathy, and understanding. Reese analyzes a body of prose writings that includes Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and midcentury short fiction by James Baldwin, Julio Cortázar, Langston Hughes, and Eudora Welty. Alongside this vibrant tradition of jazz literature, Reese considers the autobiographies of Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus, as well as works by a range of contemporary writers including Geoff Dyer, Toni Morrison, Haruki Murakami, and Zadie Smith. Throughout, Blue Notes offers original perspectives on the disparate ways in which writers acknowledge the expansive side of loneliness, reimagining solitude through narratives of connected isolation.

Theo the cat has learned to play only one blue note on his saxophone, but when a magical rocket ship carries him to the moon, he joins Charlie Porker, Nat King Cobra, Duck Ellington, and other great jazz musicians in a jam session.

What begins as one woman’s search for her own artistic courage unravels into a stunning look into what jazz music can teach out about our search for the truest version of ourselves. For decades, seasoned players on the scene have spoken in whispered tones about The Blue: a mysterious meeting place for jazz history - a place where ghosts from this music's storied past spring to life for those courageous enough to enter. When Jessie Choi's mentor Jimmy Hightower collapses at a gig and loses consciousness, she finds herself reluctantly pulled back into the jazz scene she abandoned years earlier. In investigating the music and mystery behind Jimmy's comatose state, every thread leads to the same question: is Jimmy somehow trapped in this enigma known as The Blue? In her search to save her teacher, Jessie rubs shoulders with legends, uncovers the secret history of Blue Note Records, and faces her own deepest fears.

Insightful scenes abound in the first full history of the most noted label in jazz history. With record-collector zeal, Cook analyzes everything from Sidney Bechet's 78s to Norah Jones' recent chart-topper.