Laughter From The Hip: The Lighter Side Of Jazz

from the back cover:In Laughter From the Hip Leonard Feather and Jack Tracy present us with an hilarious collection of anecdotes of some of the lighter moments in the lives of jazz greats Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Joe Venuti, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Dizzy Gillespie, Dave Brubeck, Charlie Barnet, Eddie Condon, Wingy Manone, George Shearing, and a host of others. We hear tell of the time Joe Venuti led Paul Whiteman's orchestra in "The Star-Spangled Banner" with a fishing rod - clad only in a pair of long underwear! We chuckle out loud at Leonard Feather's mock-scenario à la Hollywood, The Duke Ellington Story. We know and love the music of those master musicians who make up the unforgettable cast of real-life characters in this book. Now we meet them in a delightfully different way - shooting straight from the hip and hitting us right in the funny bone.