Is Jazz Dead? examines the state of jazz in America at the turn of the twenty-first century. Musicians themselves are returning to New Orleans, Swing, and Bebop styles, while the work of the '60s avant-garde and even '70s and '80s jazz-rock is roundly ignored. Meanwhile, global jazz musicians are creating new and exciting music that is just starting to be heard in the United States, offering a viable alternative to the rampant conservatism here. Stuart Nicholson's thought-provoking book offers an analysis of the American scene, how it came to be so stagnant, and what it can do to create a new level of creativity. This book is bound to be controversial among jazz purists and musicians; it will undoubtedly generate discussion about how jazz should grow now that it has become a recognized part of American musical history. Is Jazz Dead? dares to ask the question on all jazz fan's minds: Can jazz survive as a living medium? And, if so, how?

This definitive guide includes a unique chapter-by-chapter playlist for the reader. Jazz: A Beginner's Guide is a lively and highly accessible introduction to a global musical phenomenon. Award-winning music journalist and author Stuart Nicholson takes the reader on an entertaining journey from jazz's early stirrings in America's south through to the present day, when almost every country in the world has its own vibrant jazz scene. En route we meet a host of jazz heroes past and present, from Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman and Miles Davis, to Keith Jarrett and Kamasi Washington. Each chapter is accompanied by a playlist designed to provide a stimulating and enjoyable entry point to what has been described as the most exciting art form of all.

The Blues, that unique form of African-American music, continues to hold a fascination with each successive generation of young people. Scots-born Londoner Robert Nicholson is just one such person. Grabbed first as a teenager by the white blues sounds of the Rolling Stones and George Thorogood, he quickly became aware of the real roots of the Blues. Inspired by the great Chicago musicians Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, and B.B. King, and the Mississippi Blues originators Robert Johnson and Charlie Patton, the author embarked on a journey to trace the roots of the electric sounds of Chicago's Chess record label back to the Mississippi Delta itself, the birthplace of the Blues.

Together with Memphis-based photographer Logan Young, Robert Nicholson has conducted a series of extended field trips to the South. Their travels have brought them into contact with the Blues musicians of today. This book presents in words and images a behind-the-scenes, often intimate, portrait of the main players on the current Delta Blues scene, including Lonnie Pitchford, Booba Barnes, Scott Dunbar, Son Thomas, and others.

This important book gives a vivid account of an economically impoverished people and examines the often brittle conviviality, hidden racial tensions, and undercurrents of violence from which the Blues has grown and in which it continues to thrive. The stunning, original photographs by Logan Young enhance Nicholson's informative, entertaining, and thought-provoking text. Together they present a unique sociological and musical picture of the Mississippi Blues, and of the ways it has endured and evolved in contemporary America.