Kansas City Lightning

[GA Russell]

The eBook of Stanley Crouch's Kansas City Lightning is on sale for $2.99 today.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DG292OO

Any opinions?

[JSngry]

It's a mess, an infuriating mess. But it does have value, and I'm glad to have read it in hardcover.

[Ken Dryden]

Hopefully it would be better than Crouch's typically arrogant, self-promoting liner notes.

[John L]

Yea, it took me a long time to get through it.  But, as Jim says, it does have value.  A lot of work and research went into it.

[Brad]

I think it’s a great book, both a bio and social history. 

[Big Beat Steve]

So a question to those who've read it:

How does this book rate compared to "Kansas City Jazz - A Little Evil Will do You Good" by Con Chapman?

I already own the books on Kansas City jazz by Ross Rusell, by Nathan W. Pearson Jr. and by Frank Driggs and Chuck Haddix. 
And as much as I am interested in the history of Kansas City jazz I am unsure if there is significantly more (that's not found anywhere else) to be gained from owning ALL that have been published. 

 

And a general question on this subject that I cannot recall I have found any explanation for in any of the three books above:

How come that "Kansas City jazz" as a muscial hotbed happened almost exclusively in Kansas City, Mo., but not in Kansas City, Ks.? Though on the map they look like twin cities.
("Map" because when I read these books I've often referred to a 1948 Shell map of Missouri and Kansas City that my Ma brought home from her visit to her uncles in Steelville, Mo., in 1953 ). 
Was this only because of the Pendergast regime as an "enabler" on the Missouri side?

Edited 3 hours ago by Big Beat Steve

[Rooster_Ties]

1 hour ago, Big Beat Steve said:

How come that "Kansas City jazz" as a muscial hotbed happened almost exclusively in Kansas City, Mo., but not in Kansas City, Ks.? Though on the map they look like twin cities.

In many ways, KCMO & KCK are really one big city (plus the other inner-ring suburbs on both sides of State Line Rd).

But the majority of the Black community was in KCMO, specifically east of Troost Ave — and the heart of that community was around 18th and Vine, and 12th and Vine (all around there).

As in many, many cites in the US — there was redlining, and before that, racial covenants that excluded minorities and Jews from certain developments (effectively certain entire neighborhoods).

Not sure how far back the redlining goes historically, but the reasons for all these patterns have to do with segregation, both formal and semi-formally ‘enforced’ through all sorts of methods used widely (certainly not just in either of the Kansas Cities).

[Big Beat Steve]

Thanks, looking at history that explains a lot indeed.