Phil Pastras
University of California Press, 2002
Paperback. 255pp. b&w illustrations
£11.99

When Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton sat down at the piano in the Library of Congress in May 1938 to begin his monumental series of interviews with Alan Lomax, he spoke of his years on the West Coast with the nostalgia of a man recalling a golden age, a lost Eden. He had arrived in Los Angeles more than twenty years earlier, but he still recounted his losses vividly. The keenest loss was his separation from Anita Gonzales, by his own account "the only woman I ever loved," and to whom he left almost all of his royalties in his will.

In Dead Man Blues, Phil Pastras sets the record straight on the two periods (1917-1922 and 1940-1941) that Jelly Roll Morton spent on the West Coast. In addition to rechecking sources, correcting mistakes in scholarly accounts, and situating eyewitness narrative within the histories of New Orleans and Los Angeles, Patras offers a fresh interpretation of the life and work of Morton, one of the most important and influential early practitioners of jazz. Pastras's discovery of a previously unknown collection of memorabilia - including a 58-page scrapbook compiled by Morton himself - sheds new light on Morton's personal and artistic development, as well as on the crucial role played by Anita Gonzales.

In a rich, fast-moving and fascinating narrative, Pastras traces Morton's development as a pianist, composer, and bandleader, beginning first with the period 1917-1922, when he moved away from a living as a combination of pimp, pool hustler, gambler and musician to focus almost exclusively on music. He shows how Anita Gonzales's business acumen provided Morton with much-needed financial stability and how she encouraged him to think in a more practical, businesslike way about his music. His return to Los Angeles near the end of his life was motivated by her willingness to help finance his musical comeback and by his trust in her ability to take charge of his affairs. Among many other topics, Pastras discusses the complexities of racial identity for Morton and his circle, his belief in voodoo, his relationships with women, his style of performance, and his roots in black musical traditions. Not only does Dead Man Blues add to the historical record invaluable information about one of the great innovators of jazz, it also brings to life one of the most colourful and fascinating periods of musical transformation of the West Coast.

CONTENTS:
Preface; Acknowledgments; Prelude to a Riff; Mamanita and the 'Voodoo Witch'; L.A. Jelly, 1917-1923; The Scrapbook; Last Days; Notes; Bibliography; Index.

PHILL PASTRAS is Assistant Professor of English at Pasadena City College and co-editor and co-translator of The New Oresteia of Yannis Ritsos (1991).

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