The critic Norman Granz called tenor saxophonist Lester Young "the greatest musician I have heard on the instrument." Douglas Ramsey speaks of Young as "the gentle bedeviled genius whose vision of beauty found expression even though he was hounded throughout his life by nearly every demon the twentieth century had managed to spawn." This is his story, told with love and candor. 1994 ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for Excellence in Authorship on Musical Subjects