This authentic account of the Big Band Era and the Age of Swing is alive with firsthand dialogue by Chris Griffin. Vache traces the events spanning Griffin's career from his time in the Benny Goodman band with Harry James and Ziggy Elman in what Duke Ellington dubbed the best brass section of its day through his freelance years in radio, television and records where he recorded with legendary musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Tony Bennett, and Frank Sinatra. Griffin's honesty and humor shine through the text as he recalls a time when talent and dedication to quality were supreme. Seventeen photographs and an excellent discography provided by Ed Berger further the understanding of Griffin as a man and an artist. This book is ideal for music lovers, especially those with a keen interest in the big bands of the 1930s and the lives of the era's most memorable musicians.

The Unsung Songwriters is dedicated to a period in the history of American music that author Warren Vache calls the "Golden Age of Songwriting," and to the men and women who made it great. Contrary to the widely held opinion that most of our hit and standard songs were composed by a handful of top writers Berlin, Gershwin, Kern, Porter, and Rodgers the fact is that the vast majority of them were written by relatively unknown composers. In this definitive reference work to the "unsung songwriters," you will find Al Neiberg, the author of "It's the Talk of the Town," Maceo Pinkard, the mind behind "Sweet Georgia Brown" and "Sugar," Harry Woods for "Try a Little Tenderness," J. Fred Coots for "You Go to My Head," and many more.

This set contains the biography of drummer Johnny Blowers, who recorded with industry titans such as Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and others, and a copy of Blowers' CD Johnny Blowers & His Giants of Jazz which features 10 tracks.