New York: Macmillan Company, 1936. First Edition. The second collaborative effort by John and Alan Lomax, less a study of Negro folk songs than the oral autobiography of Huddie William Ledbetter, known to his friends as "Lead Belly." While traveling the southern states recording folk songs for the Library of... More
Boston: Oliver Ditson Company, 1905. First Edition. Landmark collection of African-American spirituals, by the first African-American to gain true eminence as a composer in the European classical style. Issued simultaneously in cloth and wrappers - both elusive in complete dustjackets. First Printing, wrappered issue. Folio (31.5cm); publisher's green cloth-backed decorative... More
![Broadside] "Friday Nites in Greenwich Village" Jazz Concert and Dance. Harold ANTON](/pictures/medium/27174.jpg?v=1546561308)
New York: 1949. First Edition. Flyer advertising the weekly show "A Tonal Paradise," presented by Harold Anton and "Raphael" at the Panel Ballroom every Friday night from 9 PM to 2 AM. The show features Gene Sedric on the clarinet, bebop songs by Anton, and "Ecstasy Provided By The Shmoo."... More
Cambridge: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1938. First Edition. Octavo (21cm.); original cloth in black pictorial dust jacket; [8],243pp. Spine a bit cocked, jacket extremities rubbed and a bit ragged with several short closed tears and subsequent creasing. Still, Very Good or better in Near Very Good jacket. "A Houghton Mifflin Fellowship... More
New York: St. Martin's Press, [2000]. First Edition. Thick octavo (24cm.); publisher's simulated cloth in decorative dust jacket; viii,872pp. Some minor wear and soil, else Very Good or better. Collected works of the jazz critic for the New Yorker. More
Urbana: University of Illinois Press, [1986]. First Edition. Octavo (23.5cm.): publisher's cloth in red and grey photo-illustrated dust jacket; xiii,[1],379pp.; illus. throughout. Jacket spine a bit sunned, else Just About Fine. More
New York: Harper & Brothers, 1932. First Edition. The career of an American jazz pianist, from his roots in a small-time dance band to fame and fortune on the scale of Gershwin and Ziegfeld. Basis for the 1941 movie Dance Hall, starring Carole Landis and Cesar Romero. For Burnett, an... More
Boston: Oliver Ditson Company, [1905]. First Edition. Landmark collection of African-American spirituals, by the first African-American to gain true eminence as a composer in the European classical style. Folio (31.5cm); publisher's green cloth-backed decorative card wrappers; [2],ix,[5],127pp.; chiefly sheet music. Extremities rubbed and textblock rather shaken, contemporary ownership signature to... More
[New York]: L.B. Fischer, [1945]. First Edition. First Printing. Octavo (20.75cm.); publisher's cloth in pictorial dust jacket; [4],219pp. Some minor chipping and one closed tear at top edge of upper jacket panel, light dust-soil, else Near Fine in Near Very Good jacket. "A white music critic falls in love with... More
[New York]: L.B. Fischer, [1945]. First Edition. First Printing. Octavo (20.75cm.); publisher's cloth in pictorial dust jacket; [4],219pp. Jacket quite chipped and worn with a number of small losses and one large loss along top edge of upper flap touching text without loss of sense. About Very Good only. "A... More
New York: Commodore Music Shop, 1940. "Corrected and Reprinted" Small octavo (18.5cm.); publisher's blue gilt-lettered cloth; 416pp. Cloth extremities rubbed with some brief exposure to corners, spine gilt quite dulled, minor white paint splatter to upper cover, some brief pencil checkmarks throughout text, contemporary ownership bookplate to front pastedown, else... More
New York: International Publishers, 1965. First Edition. Marxist perspective on the growth of the folksong movement of the Sixties. Includes discussions of Woody Guthrie, Seeger, Dylan, Ochs, Tom Paxton, Mark Spoelstra and others. 12mo. Pictorial card wrappers; 126pp. Very minor dusting to covers, else an apparently unread, Near Fine copy... More
New York: Random House, 1964. First Edition. Ellison's second book, a collection of essays "concerned with three general themes: with literature and folklore, with Negro musical expression--especially jazz and the blues--and with the complex relationship between the Negro American sub-culture and the North American culture as a whole." An especially... More
New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. First Edition. First Printing. Thick octavo (24cm.); publisher's cloth-backed boards in black decorative dust jacket; xi,[1],690pp. Light shelf wear to jacket extremities, corners bumped, light soil to top textblock edge, else Very Good and sound. More
London: Quartet Books, [1984]. First Edition. Octavo (24cm.); publisher's simulated cloth in pictorial price-clipped dust jacket; xiii,[1],306pp.; 8 leaves of illus. printed on rectos and versos. Light wear, front free endpaper has compression from previously-removed paperclip, else Very Good to Near Fine. More
New York: The Macmillan Company, 1972. Reissue of Handy's highly-regarded 1926 volume on the blues, containing lyrics and music to 53 songs inspired by the folk melodies heard up and down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. Critical text by Abbe Niles, with illustrations by Miguel Covarrubias. First printing of this... More
New York: G. Ricordi & Co, [nd, ca 1917]. First Edition. Bifolium, 21cm; cover portrait, [3pp]. Horizontal fold (as issued?), light wear; Very Good. Promotional brochure reprinting a substantial article from the Boston Evening Transcript of March 10, 1917 titled "Deep River" Popularizes a Composer, signed in print H.K.M. Cover... More
[New York]: Da Capo Paperback, [1979]. First Thus. Octavo (20.75cm.); publisher's pictorial card wrappers; xiii,[5],179pp. Wrappers a bit worn, spine quite sunned, else Very Good. The African-American jazz pianist's memoirs reissued in this edition two years after his death. More
Detroit: Broadside Press, 1970. Revised Edition. The highly-politicized Philadelphia jazz poet's second book, with Afro-centric illustrations throughout by B.L. Carpenter. First Printing of the "Revised Edition." Slim octavo (21.5cm); illustrated wrappers, stapled; 32pp; illus. Top edge slightly dusty, else Fine. More
New York: Random House, [1958]. First Edition. First Printing. Octavo (20.75cm.); original cloth over boards, black pictorial dust jacket, black topstain; [12],243pp. Minor wear to jacket flap folds and spine ends, boards just a hint rubbed, else a Very Good or better copy. Novel about an African-American jazz saxophonist with... More
New York: E.P. Dutton, 1947. First Edition. Third volume of Willis's loosely-connected postwar trilogy about jazz musicians in the Midwest. Preceded by Tangleweed (1943) and The Wild Faun (1945). HANNA 3829. Octavo (21cm). Black cloth boards, stamped in red on spine and front cover; dustjacket; 223pp. Review copy, with publisher's... More
New York: Oxford University Press, 1989. First Edition. Second volume in Schuller's monumental The History of Jazz, documenting the swing era. First Printing. Octavo (24cm); black paper and blue-gray cloth-covered boards, with titles stamped in silver and metallic pink on spine; dustjacket; xviii,919,[7]pp. Textblock sagging, faint foxing to upper edge... More
![Where's the Melody?: A Listener's Introduction to Jazz [Inscribed]. JAZZ, Martin WILLIAMS](/pictures/medium/45001.jpg?v=1562966331)
New York: Pantheon Books, 1966. Reprint. Octavo; red cloth, with titling and decorations stamped in gilt and in blind to spine and front cover; dustjacket; xvi,205pp. Inscribed by the author on the front endpaper: "Dear Ralph, If you're gonna start (and I sure hope you're gonna!), this is my idea... More
New York: St. Martin's Press, 1970. First American Edition. Octavo. Brick red cloth (hardcover); dustjacket; 272pp. Faint foxing to endpapers, else a tight, Near Fine copy in the original pictorial dustwrapper, also faintly foxed on flaps but crisp, clean and unclipped. Collection of Larkin's jazz record reviews for the London... More
London: Scala, (2006). First Edition. Quarto. Cloth boards (hardcover); dustjacket; 239pp; illus. Fine, unmarked and unworn copy in crisp, clean dustwrapper, very Near Fine. First full monograph devoted to the life and work of Leonard, arguably the 20th century's greatest jazz photographer. A lovely copy. More
