Monthly Archives: February 2010

Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong

Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong

Product Details
Hardcover: 496 pages
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (December 2, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0151010897
ISBN-13: 978-0151010899
Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6.3 x 1.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds

Crafted with a musician’s ear and an historian’s eye, Pops is a vibrant biography of the iconic Louis Armstrong that resonates with the same warmth as ol’ Satchmo’s distinctive voice. Wall Street Journal critic Terry Teachout draws from a wealth of previously unavailable material – including over 650 reels of Armstrong’s own personal tape recordings – to create an engaging profile that slips behind the jazz legend’s megawatt smile. Teachout reveals that the beaming visage of “Reverend Satchelmouth” was not a mark of racial subservience, but a clear symbol of Louis’s refusal to let anything cloud the joy he derived from blowing his horn. “Faced with the terrible realities of the time and place into which he had been born,” explains Teachout, “he didn’t repine, but returned love for hatred and sought salvation in work.” Armstrong was hardly impervious to the injustices of his era, but in his mind, nothing was more sacred than the music. –Dave Callanan

Product Description

Louis Armstrong was the greatest jazz musician of the twentieth century and a giant of modern American culture. He knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts, wrote the finest of all jazz autobiographies–without a collaborator–and created collages that have been compared to the art of Romare Bearden. The ranks of his admirers included Johnny Cash, Jackson Pollock and Orson Welles. Offstage he was witty, introspective and unexpectedly complex, a beloved colleague with an explosive temper whose larger-than-life personality was tougher and more sharp-edged than his worshipping fans ever knew.

Wall Street Journal arts columnist Terry Teachout has drawn on a cache of important new sources unavailable to previous Armstrong biographers, including hundreds of private recordings of backstage and after-hours conversations that Armstrong made throughout the second half of his life, to craft a sweeping new narrative biography of this towering figure that shares full, accurate versions of such storied events as Armstrong’s decision to break up his big band and his quarrel with President Eisenhower for the first time. Certain to be the definitive word on Armstrong for our generation, Pops paints a gripping portrait of the man, his world and his music that will stand alongside Gary Giddins’ Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Peter Guralnick’s Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley as a classic biography of a major American musician.

Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality ~ Donald Miller

From Publishers Weekly

Miller (Prayer and the Art of Volkswagen Maintenance) is a young writer, speaker and campus ministry leader. An earnest evangelical who nearly lost his faith, he went on a spiritual journey, found some progressive politics and most importantly, discovered Jesus’ relevance for everyday life. This book, in its own elliptical way, tells the tale of that journey. But the narrative is episodic rather than linear, Miller’s style evocative rather than rational and his analysis personally revealing rather than profoundly insightful. As such, it offers a postmodern riff on the classic evangelical presentation of the Gospel, complete with a concluding call to commitment. Written as a series of short essays on vaguely theological topics (faith, grace, belief, confession, church), and disguised theological topics (magic, romance, shifts, money), it is at times plodding or simplistic (how to go to church and not get angry? “pray… and go to the church God shows you”), and sometimes falls into merely self-indulgent musing. But more often Miller is enjoyably clever, and his story is telling and beautiful, even poignant. (The story of the reverse confession booth is worth the price of the book.) The title is meant to be evocative, and the subtitle-”Non-Religious” thoughts about “Christian Spirituality”-indicates Miller’s distrust of the institutional church and his desire to appeal to those experimenting with other flavors of spirituality.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Description

I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn’t resolve. . . . I used to not like God because God didn’t resolve. But that was before any of this happened. In Donald Miller’s early years, he was vaguely familiar with a distant God. But when he came to know Jesus Christ, he pursued the Christian life with great zeal. Within a few years he had a successful ministry that ultimately left him feeling empty, burned out, and, once again, far away from God. In this intimate, soul-searching account, Miller describes his remarkable journey back to a culturally relevant, infinitely loving God.

Hang~The Jongleurs

Product Details
Original Release Date: September 18, 2006
Label: NCM East Records
Copyright: (C) 1999 NCM East Records
Duration: 5:13 minutes
Genres: Jazz/General, Jazz/Avant Garde & Free Jazz, Jazz
ASIN: B000QM0SK4

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If Saints win coin toss, Super Bowl could be over before it starts

Shortly before the kickoff of Super Bowl 44 on Sunday, a group of captains representing the Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints will meet at midfield. Referee Scott Green will introduce the ceremonial coin and a member of the newly elected Pro Football Hall of Fame class of 2010 will toss it to determine who gets the ball first. Saints quarterback Drew Brees(notes) will watch it spin into the Miami night and will call heads or tails.

And if he’s lucky, he’s wrong.

Of the 43 Super Bowls, the team that won the pregame coin toss has won 20 times and lost 23, a .465 winning percentage, and has lost 10 of the last 13. The Arizona Cardinals won the coin toss last year in Tampa, Fla., and, trying to buck history, became the first team to defer. Didn’t matter: They lost, too.

The NFL’s conferences alternate as the home team in the Super Bowl. The AFC is home this year, so the Colts had their choice of jerseys (they’ll be in blue) and will stand on the sideline closer to the main CBS cameras. As the visiting team, the NFC’s Saints will call the coin flip. The recent trend points to them being right.

Whether this should make Saints fans nervous is a matter of debate; because of the small sample size, some statisticians argue that the win-loss record of coin-toss winners is statistically insignificant. But decide for yourself: The NFC has won 12 straight coin flips and is 2-10 in those games.

If the Saints do win the coin toss, would it improve their odds of victory if they score first? Yes and no. Teams that score first are 28-15 but have lost five of the last eight.

Other Super Bowl coin-flip facts:

• In 43 games, the coin has come up heads 22 times, tails 21.
• The NFC has won the toss 29 times, the AFC 14.
• As mentioned, the NFC has won 12 straight flips. The odds of that: 1 in 8,192.
• The game’s coin traveled into space with the shuttle Atlantis in November.

It wasn’t until Super Bowl XII between the Dallas Cowboys and Denver Broncos that the NFL began honoring its legends during the pregame ceremony. Red Grange was the first honorary coin-tosser. The Cowboys correctly guessed heads and won the game 27-10.