The Jazzmen

Centering on the lives and legacies of Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, and Duke Ellington, this week’s review uncovers how the three jazz legends navigated “the mine-laden world of entertainment as African Americans.”

Posted on June 9, 2025 in Reviews of the Month

The Jazzmen: How Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Count Basie Transformed America

Tye, Larry. Mariner Books, 2024
416p bibl index, 9780358380436 $32.50

Jazzmen: How Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Count Basie Transformed America book cover.

While Tye’s new book is about three “pantheon” jazz artists, it is only marginally about their music. Rather, Tye (author and award-winning reporter) has essentially written personal profiles of these greats: in effect, three concurrent short biographies. He details the importance of their respective cities, childhoods, and families, while also addressing each of their fetishes, dependencies, misogyny, difficult personal relationships, and other foibles. The strongest theme of the book is how Armstrong, Basie, and Ellington negotiated the mine-laden world of entertainment as African Americans (including the tricky entertainer-versus-artist divide), where racism was a given condition of the business as well as of everyday life. Powerful white allies, often gangsters, were necessary for their survival in this cutthroat world, and careful choices had to be made to overcome dangers and roadblocks that all three surmounted eventually and triumphantly. Even serious jazz fans may be surprised by what Tye has unearthed, or finally exposed, in a volume aimed at a wide audience. While Tye’s research is thorough and deep, this is not an academic book per se. However, it would be a valuable addition to collections of all types.

Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers.
Reviewer: K. R. Dietrich, emeritus, Ripon College
Interdisciplinary Subject: African and African American Studies
Subject: Humanities – Performing Arts – Music
Choice Issue: Dec 2024

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