Sigma Alpha Iota

Fall 2020 44 P A N P I P E S BLUES BEFORE SUNRISE 2: INTERVIEWS FROM THE CHICAGO SCENE Steve Cushing, University of Illinois Press, 2019. B lues Before Sunrise 2: Interviews from the Chicago Scene, like Blues Before Sunrise: The Radio Interviews published in 2010, is a collection of interviews transcribed from the Chicago based radio show that Steve Cushing hosted for over 40 years. The twenty-two interviews contained in this book are divided into four sections: Talkin' bout you (jazz personalities discussing other musicians); Amen Corner (those musicians that made religious recordings); Bronzeville (notables from the Black South Chicago of the same name); and Short-Order Chicago (early interviews conducted before the author acclimated to a longer format). Interview subjects include musicians ranging from Clarence Small from the famed "Wings over Jordan" choir; Scotty Piper, tailor to Jack Johnson, the Ink Spots, etc.; Dick LaPalm, record promoter and friend to Nat King Cole; and a host of others. The success of these interviews is Cushing's ability to put his subjects at ease and elicit extended accounts with very few questions. Transcriptions are well edited to maintain flow, yet individual personalities still shine through every interview. For those with an interest in Chicago blues from the 20's to the 40's who don't have access to the original live interviews, this book is an excellent way to learn about both the culture and personalities of the era. Robert Bruns is a Bandmaster in the United States Army and an SAI Friend of the Arts. He received his Bachelor and Master in Music Education degrees at Ithaca College. REVIEWS SEX, DEATH, AND MINUETS: ANNA MAG- DALENA BACH AND HER MUSICAL NOTE- BOOKS David Yearsley, University of Chicago Press, 2019. A lthough the title of this new book is a bit irreverent, it is an insightful, entertaining, and absorbing text about Anna Magdalena Bach (1701- 1760), someone who, over 300 years after her birth, remains in the shadow of her monumental husband, Johann Sebastian Bach. She is primarily familiar in the context of the two musical notebooks that bear her name, which were compiled for her by her husband. Yearsley now seeks to amplify our knowledge of her. The most significant problem facing anyone attempting to write about Anna Magdalena Bach is how little direct documentation of her life is extant. Some entries in church registers, reference to her in a few letters written by a relative, her signature in account books acknowledging receipt of widows' alms, and a brief funeral notice constitute the paucity of evidence that she even existed. Anna Magdalena received the 1722 Notebook in the first year of her marriage to Johann Sebastian Bach. Unfortunately, approximately two-thirds of its content have been lost. However, the second Notebook from 1725 is primarily intact. Both manuscripts contain mostly fragments and excerpts of Johann Sebastian Bach's keyboard music, although some vocal music is included. The 1725 Notebook also contains some works of other composers. The entries of both Notebooks are in Anna Magdalena's own hand, as well as in the hand of Johann Sebastian and some others. Overall, the type and style of music found in the Notebooks can provide a compelling picture of domestic life in 18 th century Germany, as Yearsley goes on to show in his book. The first chapter in the book discusses how Anna Magdalena has been viewed throughout history, most commonly as a "selfless soulmate" to Johann Sebastian, particularly in the many quasi-biographical novels published after her death up to the 20 th century. As depicted in these writings, Anna Magdalena was "the nurturing Bach wife and mother, always adoring and mostly mute, the patron saint of many of the world's musical children, who play the dances of her Notebooks, the soundtrack of a good home" (p. 42). Yearsley devotes the remainder of his book to using the content of Anna Magdalena's Notebooks as a lens through which to view a more precise interpretation of the life she lived. Subsequent chapters break down the contents of the Notebooks into various subject areas that would have been relevant to a woman of Anna Magdalena's time and social position, including weddings and romantic life, death and widowhood, and aspects of the popular culture of the era such as coffee consumption and fashion. Yearsley is an erudite and witty writer, and the book is never dull or pedantic. His clever turns of phrase sustain the pleasure found in reading the book (one of my favorite passages includes his review of a novel about Anna Magdalena from the mid-nineteenth century that he describes as "baggy" and "lurching"). I would highly recommend Sex, Death, and Minuets as a fascinating investigation of a significant and wrongly-neglected figure in the history of music. Anna Magdalena Bach was more than the wife of a revered composer, and her Notebooks can tell modern audiences much about the concerns and relevance of women's lives in the eighteenth century. Kathi Bower Peterson, an SAI Philanthropies coordinator, is a graduate of Indiana University, where she majored in music history and was a member of Iota Epsilon chapter. She has an MM in musicology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an MLIS from San Jose State University. She has been the librarian at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla, CA for 22 years and currently serves as the treasurer of the San Diego County Alumnae Chapter.

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