A Jazz Messiah

Practice makes perfect. With John Coltrane, practice made him a world-renowned jazz legend. In John Coltrane: His Life and Music, a remarkable biography on one of the best jazz saxophonists of the twentieth century, Lewis Porter delves deep into the development of Coltrane’s music and how his obsessions with practice refined his style as he moved from bebop to avant garde. On the life portion, Porter traces all the way back to southern roots to show how Coltrane was named after a Scottish ancestor. On the musical part, Porter’s meticulous and accessible analysis of Coltrane’s accomplishments, including My Favorite Things, Giant Steps, Kind of Blue (his contribution to Miles Davis), and his most famous suit A Love Supreme, through note and scale demonstrations makes the book both fascinating and informing to read. If you have loved Coltrane’s works, you’ll appreciate them even further after reading this book.