Bill Bryson

I'm into my second Bill Bryson book, Notes From a Big Country. I was so impressed by Notes From a Small Island that it became  my quest to read everything he wrote whether it be his hilariously funny, and yet accurately perceptive, travel books or a note to the milkman.

He served time as Chancellor of Durham University and it is to my eternal shame that, because of my ignorance, I didn't nip down the A1 and invite him out for a beer or two.

What's all this got to do with jazz? I hear you ask. Well, in a sense, a little and a lot!

My dear friend, jazz drummer, artist and cartoonist, the late Bill Shaw once said to me you must read Bill Bryson. I put it on the backburner and promptly forgot about it. Unfortunately, Bill Shaw died so there were no reminders.

Time passed until, looking for something to read in a local charity shop, I noticed a copy of Notes From a Small Island that had no missing pages, tea stains or other deterrents so, after noting that one of the literary critics in The Observer, a newspaper that changes its name to The Guardian (or is it vice versa?) on Sundays described it as 'Laugh-Out-Loud'. It was mine for a mere £1.10 and I was helping the Salvation Army as well. I guessed it would be a worthwhile investment as we all like to laugh out loud - now more than ever - and I figured that these Observer/Guardian Johnnies/Joannas would know what they were chuckling over.

And chuckle I did, in fact I was laughing so loudly that I was almost evicted from the pub for being drunk and disorderly which was only half true.

So now, back to the jazz. Somewhere along the way he writes "I'm not into Dukes and Earls outside of jazz music".

Where he is into jazz, even if he doesn't know it, is in his writing, the way he phrases a sentence, the laconic observations are as cool and perceptive as a solo by Stan Getz or Chet Baker. He's telling the world what they can't see. The way a jazz musician interprets a mediocre song and turns it into a work of art.

That's it. I've got a book to finish reading and a whole lot more of them to discover. Lance