Bass Lines A Life in Jazz

Bass player Coleridge Goode recalls his Jamaican childhood, his arrival in Britain in the 1930s and the lively wartime London club scene. He recounts his career including working with the Ray Ellington Quartet of Goon Show fame and his long association with altoist Joe Harriott, the brilliant but tragic pioneer of European free jazz.

Goode recorded with Django Reinhardt, Stéphane Grappelli, Ray Nance, George Shearing and other jazz stars. Always among the innovators, he has helped blend jazz with Indian music, serial compositions, choral works and poetry.

In this book he tells candidly of the challenges and rewards of the jazz life as well as the destructive aspects he has seen – especially racial discrimination and drugs.

A contributor to many of the most exciting jazz developments of the past half century, Coleridge Goode is a thoughtful witness to a fascinating part of jazz history.