Concerto for Cootie, The Life and Times of Cootie Williams

[Steve Bowie]

RELEASE DATE - 17 NOVEMBER 2025

The first full-length biography of a true giant of jazz

Description

Jazz legend Cootie Williams left home to start his career as a professional musician at the age of fifteen. In 1940, after eleven years as one of the major soloists with the Duke Ellington orchestra, Williams was lured away to the band of Benny Goodman, one of the most popular bands in the country. At the time, it was a controversial move—it was still taboo for African Americans to share the bandstand with white people. Current references to the move usually reduce it to a song written by Raymond Scott, "When Cootie Left the Duke." In reality, it was a seismic event. The Black press predicted Black bands would collapse from raids on their ranks. White musicians were afraid they would be put out of work. And the white press stirred up visions of Black musicians mixing with white women in the new landscape of integrated orchestras.

The twenty years trumpeter Williams spent as a band leader (1942-1962) have been covered in only the barest of details. His involvement in politics and the civil rights movement have not been detailed before. An astute talent scout, Williams and his band launched the careers of Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson, Earl “Bud” Powell, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, and Pearl Bailey. He also was the first to record the music of a young Thelonious Monk, using two of Monk's compositions (“Epistrophy” and “‘Round Midnight”) as theme songs for his band.

Steven C. Bowie respectfully tells Williams’s story, from his Alabama ancestry onward, including many new details rediscovered from the historical archives of the African American press and those gleaned from the author’s interviews with his friends and colleagues.

[HutchFan]

Very cool.  Thanks for sharing this info!  

 

[Big Beat Steve]

This sounds very interesting. I am tempted ... 

[mikeweil]

Me too.

[Steve Bowie]

I also compiled a 4CD set to supplement the book. https://www.jazzwise.com/review/cootie-williams-concerto-for-cootie-selected-recordings-1928-1962

[Dan Gould]

Thanks for the info this is definitely on my radar ... is there a purchase link or should I just go thru Amazon?

[Steve Bowie]

2 minutes ago, Dan Gould said:

Thanks for the info this is definitely on my radar ... is there a purchase link or should I just go thru Amazon?

It’s available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and more. It’s available through the publisher, University Press of Mississippi here - https://www.upress.state.ms.us/Books/C/Concerto-for-Cootie

[Dan Gould]

10 minutes ago, Steve Bowie said:

It’s available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and more. It’s available through the publisher, University Press of Mississippi here - https://www.upress.state.ms.us/Books/C/Concerto-for-Cootie

Thanks for that link ... another great trumpeter getting the bio treatment in early 2026:  Kenny Dorham.

[ghost of miles]

Definitely in for this!

[ghost of miles]

42 minutes ago, Dan Gould said:

Thanks for that link ... another great trumpeter getting the bio treatment in early 2026:  Kenny Dorham.

What?! Thanks for the tip on this, Dan... any more info re author or publishing press?

[Niko]

https://www.upress.state.ms.us/Books/W/Whistle-Stop

The Dorham bio is advertised on the same page....

[Dan Gould]

1 hour ago, ghost of miles said:

What?! Thanks for the tip on this, Dan... any more info re author or publishing press?

See Niko's comment above.

 

[Ken Dryden]

Cootie Williams was one of the first Duke Ellington soloists who I heard on my father's Duke Ellington records. This should be a fascinating book.