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Really the blues / by Mezz Mezzrow and Bernard Wolfe ; introduction by Ben Ratliff.

by Mezzrow, Mezz, 1899-1972.

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New York Review Books, 2016.

781.65092 M617r

Mezzrow, Mezz, 1899-1972.

Clarinetists -- Illinois -- Chicago -- Biography.

Saxophonists -- Illinois -- Chicago -- Biography.

Jazz musicians -- United States -- Biography.

Jewish musicians -- Illinois -- Chicago.

New York Review Books classics.

9781590179451 (pbk.)

xiii, 435 pages ; 21 cm.

Reprint. Originally published: New York : Random House, 1946.

Includes index.

Book one (1899-1923) : A nothin' but a child. Don't cry, Ma ; Not too far tangent ; The Band House, The Band House ; Quit foolin' with that comb -- Book two (1923-1928) : Chicago, Chicago. They found the body in a ditch ; Them first kicks are a killer ; Tea don't do you that way ; Got the heebies, got the jeebies ; Forgottenest man in town -- Book three (1928-1935) : The Big Apple. If you can't make money ; Vo-do-de-o and a Minsky pizzicato ; Tell a green man something ; Once more, again, and another time ; Tough scuffle, Mezzie ; Crawl 'fore you can walk -- Book four (1935-?) : Basin Street is the street. God sure don't like ugly ; Out of the gallion -- Appendices. 1. New Orleans and Chicago : the root and the branch ; 2. Translation of the jive section ; 3. A note on the Panassié recordings ; 4. Glossary.

Mezz Mezzrow was a boy from Chicago who learned to play the sax in reform school and pursued a life in music and a life of crime. He moved from Chicago to New Orleans to New York, working in brothels and bars, bootlegging, dealing drugs, getting hooked, doing time, producing records, and playing with the greats, among them Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, and Fats Waller. Really the Blues, the jive-talking memoir that Mezzrow wrote at the insistence of, and with the help of, the novelist Bernard Wolfe, is the story of an unusual and unusually American life, and a portrait of a man who moved freely across racial boundaries when few could or did, "the odyssey of an individualist . . . the saga of a guy who wanted to make friends in a jungle where everyone was too busy making money."

"Milton Mesirow, better known as Mezz Mezzrow (1899 - 1972) was an American jazz clarinetist and saxophonist from Chicago, Illinois. He is well known for organizing and financing historic recording sessions with Tommy Ladnier and Sidney Bechet. He also recorded a number of times with Bechet and briefly acted as manager for Louis Armstrong. Mezzrow is equally well remembered as a colorful character, as portrayed in his autobiography, Really the Blues (which takes its title from a Bechet composition), co-written with Bernard Wolfe and published in 1946."--From wikipedia.org website.

Autobiographies.

Wolfe, Bernard, 1915-1985.

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