A great biography of the Godfather of British Blues and one of the most important musicians on the British scene in the 1960´s and 1970´s, who educated a whole generation of British musicians.

Superb book by one of the greatest Jazz writers, who is able to grasp the late developments in the ever expanding Jazz vocabulary, including Jazz-Rock Fusion, Jazz-World Fusion and Free Jazz. Excellently written and stimulating.

A great book about the much neglected subject of the important 1970´s development in both jazz and rock music. This one is more for the jazz-oriented reader, but fans of Jazz-Rock Fusion should not miss this one. Although scholarly at times, it includes a wealth of information and insight well worth investigating.

Nicolausson was the editor of the oldest Jazz periodical in the world, called "Orkester Journalen" and his metriculous discography of Swedish Jazz is a classic in the field.

This is a fascinating history of the Polish Blues-Rock group Blackout, one of the pivotal and most important, but short lived groups on the Polish 1960s scene, which later developed in the group Breakout, which dominated the Polish Rock scene in the 1970s.

Meticulously researched and including many photographs, the group tells the history of the group between late 1965 and early 1968, when it morphed into Breakout. Personal clashes between the founder / leader Tadeusz Nalepa and lead singer Stan Borys, as well as the presence of lead singer Mira Kubasinska, created a tense atmosphere, but nevertheless the group had little competition on the Polish scene and enjoyed wide popularity and success in the radio charts.

Every musician involved with the group is interviewed in depth, telling (to the best of their ability after many years) their "side" of the story. A CD with ultra-rare live performance by the group in 1966 is included.

This is a great piece of the Polish Rock history, which should be of interest to all the fans of the early days of that fascinating period.

Well written biography of Miles Davis, full of facts and musical analysis, leaving the gossip aside. Unfortunately it does not cover the very last period of Miles´ life.

Brilliant book by one of the greatest specialist on Free Jazz and Improvised Music, German critic / writer Bert Noglik. The author presents a series of essays portraying the most important European musicians / innovators like Evan Parker, Willem Breuker, Tony Oxley and many others. The book was published in DDR (East Germany), which is in itself quite amazing.
I have a spare copy of this rare book if anybody is interested, but it is in German ;)

This is a special edition of the FMP label catalog published to celebrate its 20th Anniversary, with a wonderful essay by critic Bert Noglic about about Improvised Music. Text in German and English.

Brilliant book about Free Jazz and Improvised music in the DDR (East Germany), based on the interviews with leading East German musicians, who were one of the world´s pioneers of these genres.

This fascinating book is the first biography of the European Jazz icon, Polish violinist Zbigniew Seifert. Born in Krakow, Poland on June 7, 1946 Seifert was a completely unique phenomenon, a musical Genius and a wonderful person and his life´s story, tragically cut short by cancer at the ridiculous age of 32 (he died February 14, 1979 in Buffalo, USA) is an epic of Hollywood proportions. Like the young Icarus, Seifert soared through the sky with his music, but his destiny was for his lofty plans to remain unfulfilled.

Seifert´s contribution to Polish Jazz as a leader of his own quartet (late 1960s) and a member of the Tomasz Stanko quintet (early 1970s) is colossal. He was a pivot figure in the transition of Polish Jazz from the early phase dominated by American Jazz tradition into the new European Jazz, emancipated from the restriction imposed upon the music by earlier concepts.

His international (first European and later also American) career in the mid to late 1970s, which was his most illustrious, although heavily disrupted by his illness in the last three years of his life, is one of the highlights of European Jazz, of which he became one of the brightest stars.

The author meticulously collected a vast amount of facts, documents, letters, photographs, articles, record reviews, interviews and other biographical data and wove them into a lucid, chronological story, which is easily readable and highly educational. She avoids commentary (or keeps it to the minimum) on matters which had political, sociological or other implications, keeping the text on subject at all times.

The musical criticism in this book is limited to quotes from other musicians or articles / reviews quoted. There is no serious musical analysis present, neither from the musicological nor historical point of view, which is perhaps for the good of the book as it stands. Such highly professional writing might have turned the book into a much more difficult reading experience, reducing the potential readership to a selected group of specialists. This book is intended for a wide audience, for people who knew him personally (like myself), people familiar with his music and especially for the young generation of Jazz musicians and fans, who definitely should be aware of this great man´s heritage.

The fact that the book was published in polish unfortunately limits the accessibility to readers familiar with that language, but I do hope this will be remedied at some point, as it definitely deserves to be available to all Jazz fans around the globe.

Thank you Aneta for your hard work, inspiration and dedication needed to complete this project!

A catalog of Norvegian Jazz records.

An overview of the Norwegian Jazz scene.