Catalano's book about Clifford Brown fails to convey much more than lame summary. The reader receives a readable account of the trumpeter's short life, but the writing itself leaves much to be desired in that it's unpolished, redundant, chatty, and rarely profound. (And it's got typos to boot!) How about this telling detail of Brown's stint in an R&B band? "Clifford Brown and Vance Wilson were quite close and got the kind of education that only comes from being on the road. One time, recalled Wilson, 'We were in Wildwood [New Jersey]. Clifford had never eaten raw clams and neither had I. So we dared each other. We went over to this counter where they were serving them, but we didn't know how to eat them.' They proceeded to put sauce on the clams and started to chew them, failing to notice other eaters who were 'slurping' them. Their exaggerated chewing made everyone laugh" (Catalano 62). Catalano's choice of quotations, in my opinion, is very suspect throughout the entire book. It's as though he's a high-school-essay-writing-novice trying to round out a paper and show that's he read a thing or two or interviewed someone or another, as the case may be. Ok, the book does contain some analysis of Brown's music, and provided that not much else has been written of the trumpeter, I suppose the book merits a cursory glance. But be prepared for some dull, over-accessible, easy-reading.

I read this modest little work last summer in a cottage in the lakeland region of central Finland. The silence around me allowed me to think about Brownie's playing -its purity and clarity- uncontaminated by other music or noise. Of course the first thing I wanted to do when I got back to my records was listen to Brownie over and over again. Catalano paints a sensitive portrait in an approachable, occasionally shoddy style. Clifford Brown's music doesn't quite come alive, perhaps, but Catalano expresses the lucidity of the trumpeter's musical vision and astonishing melodic gift with some agility. It's not a penetrating insight, but there is no other book around (as far as I know) that tells the poignant story of the great trumpeter's short life, so this is an essential purchase.

This is a good biography. Nevertheless, musical analyses are very weak and superflous.