Jazz Country: Ralph Ellison in America

Contents

Contents Acknowledgments xi Chronology: Ralph Ellison, 1914–1994 xiii Jazz States: Ralph Waldo Ellison’s Major Chords 1 1 Jazz Essays Ellison on Charlie Christian, Jimmy Rushing, Mahalia Jackson, and Lester Young 17 The Solo Voice of Charlie Christian’s Guitar 17 Reducing the Chaos of Living to Form: The Affirmative Voices of Jimmy Rushing and Mahalia Jackson 22 Charlie Christian and the Influence of Lester Young 25 Soul Brothers Charlie Christian and Benny Goodman: Jazz, Race, and Cultural Exchange 27 2 Jazz Icons Ellison on Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Charlie Parker 32 American Masters: Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong 32 Mocking Entertainers: Ellison on Louis Armstrong and Charlie Parker 42 3 Jazz Trio Ralph Ellison, Romare Bearden, and Albert Murray 49 Renaissance Men: Ralph Ellison, Romare Bearden, and Albert Murray 49 The Novelist and the Painter: Shared Visions of Jazz and Art 51 Shared Assumptions: Albert Murray Riffs on the Marvelous, the Terrible, and the Heroic in African American Culture 61 4 Jazz Underground Invisible Man as Jazz Text 72 Invisible Man as Jazz Text 72 Invisibility Blues 76 Notes Underground 77 Harlem Riot: Jazz Aesthetics 83 5 Jazz in Progress Juneteenth, Ellison’s Second Novel 92 The Long Wait: Ellison and Poetic Closure 92 A Jazzman Burns His White Cadillac 95 A Jazzman’s Duet and Solo 101 6 Jazz Preaching Reverend Hickman and the Battered Silver Trombone 105 The Performed Word 105 Dry Bones in the Valley 109 Improvisation: Ellison Riffs on T. S. Eliot and Rev. C. L. Franklin 114 Ellison, Ellington, and Transcendence 117 7 Jazz Trumpet No End Ellison’s Riffs with Irving Howe and Other Critics 120 Ralph Ellison: The Yecke 120 Ralph Ellison and Irving Howe 122 Ralph Ellison: The Grand Aesthetician 131 Ralph Ellison: The Elitist? 133 Ralph Waldo Ellison: Jazz Artist and Metaphysical Rebel 137 Notes 149 Index 159 ...