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Russ Chase
By Don Rayno. Studies in Jazz No. 43, The Scarecrow Press, Inc., Lanham, Md., and Oxford. 2003, 773 plus xxviii pp, plus a glossy photo section of 32 pp. Hardcover. $49.95.
paul whiteman
Don Rayno's 20 years or more of dedicated research into the life of Paul Whiteman is beginning to show results. I say beginning because we have only Volume I so far, and it is gigantic. Unbelievable, in fact. Don is now working on Volume II and it will appear sooner than 20 years from now, I daresay. Already in the hopper are interviews he conducted over the years with as many surviving band members from the 1930s and 1940s as he could find.
A most logical choice of one to get the pages from Don before the ink had dried was Norman Gentieu, who served as editor on the project. At the outset of the volume, he has a few words to impart, as only he can, on how Paul Whiteman was maligned by members of the jazz press over the years. For a brief summation of these writings, he borrowed a quote from Al Smith: "No matter how thin you slice it, it's still baloney." I would agree that many of the naysayer writers, were they afforded...