Book Description
Based on extensive interviews, Oscar Peterson is a well-informed and provocative exploration of Peterson's music.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Duke Ellington once called Oscar Peterson the "maharajah of the piano." Drawn from extensive interviews, this enlightening biography delves deeply into Peterson's extraordinary career to offer a profound and engaging portrait of a living musical legend. It is also a well-informed and provocative exploration of Peterson's music, a revolutionary fusion of swing and bop styles that overhauled jazz as we know it.

Lees looks carefully at Peterson's childhood and what it meant to be black and talented in Montreal in the 1940s, his three marriages and six children, his musical partners (Ray Brown, Herb Ellis, and Ed Thigpen), his musical friends and colleagues (Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Tatum, and Lester Young, to name a few), and the critical controversy and mythology that have long surrounded Peterson.

The comprehensive new chapter covers Peterson's appointment as Chancellor of York University; his receipt of ten honorary doctorates and the Order of Canada; his stroke and partial recovery therefrom; the origins and fallout of his cancelled North American tour; and much more.

Written with anecdotal exuberance that recalls the best jazz improvisation, Oscar Peterson: The Will to Swing is must-reading for lovers of jazz, of course, but also for all those interested in the life and career of an exemplary artist.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

A fine song lyricist and writer on jazz delineates the career and personality of Canada's outstanding living musician, 65-year-old pianist Oscar Peterson, who is loved and respected throughout the world. Brought up by his stern taskmaster father and already a virtuoso in his early teens, Peterson was displayed by his manager Norman Granz at Carnegie Hall in 1949, and has probably been recorded more frequently than any other jazz musician. Here are enjoyable stories about his accomplishments and pranks, his marriages and children, his extraordinary musical relationships with bassist Ray Brown, guitarist Herb Ellis and drummer Edmund Thigpen, his numerous awards and 10 honorary doctorates. Lees tells the story extremely well and lays out the principles of criticism in a uniquely illuminating fashion. Photos. (July)

Library Journal