The entire story of jazz - from its earliest days in New Orleans to the 1970s and beyond - told through archival material from Verve, the genre's most important label. Verve signed practically every major jazz artist of the 1950s and 1960s and is home to some of the greatest music ever recorded. Charlie Parker, Count Basie, Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson, and Ella Fitzgerald all released records through Verve. This superb new volume presents some of the rarest records and unseen ephemera from the label that helped define the world of jazz. Hundreds of the best examples of iconic seven-inch, ten-inch, and twelve-inch records appear, along with publicity reports, news clippings, posters, telegrams, and programmes. The ultimate music guide, the book includes features on key artists and key albums as well as insightful timelines that connect Verve with wider musical history. Looking beyond the music scene, the book discusses segregation in America, the missions to take jazz to Europe and the world, the clubs, the places, and the people who made Verve great and jazz cool. Commentary from the biggest names in jazz today, including some of Verve's own artists, complements the text. 1,200 illustrations in color and black and white.

Author Biography

Richard Havers is Universal Music's jazz consultant. He has produced box sets, including '100 Years of the Blues', 'Louis Armstrong - Ambassador of Jazz', 'Ella - The Voice of Jazz', 'Verve - The Sound of America', 'Blue Note's Uncompromising Expression' and a ten-CD career retrospective of Nat King Cole. He has written numerous sleeve notes and books to accompany album and DVD releases, including many for The Rolling Stones. A prolific music writer he won the Blues Foundation's Award for Literature in 2002. His articles have been published in the Daily Telegraph, The Times, Goldmine and Record Collector.