Gary Giddins

Giddins speaking at an American Library Association conference in Chicago, 2009.

Gary Giddins (born 1948) is an American jazz critic and author. He wrote for The Village Voice from 1973; his "Weather Bird" column ended in 2003. In 1986 Gary Giddins and John Lewis created the American Jazz Orchestra which presented concerts using a jazz repertory with musicians such as Tony Bennett.

For five years, Giddins was the executive director of the Leon Levy Center for Biography at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Selected works

Books

• Riding on a Blue Note (1981)
• Rhythm-a-ning (1985)
• Celebrating Bird (1987)
• Satchmo (1988)
• Faces in the Crowd (1992)
• Visions of Jazz: The First Century (1998)
• Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams - The Early Years, 1903-1940 (2001)
• Weather Bird (2004)
• Natural Selection (2006)
• Jazz (2009)
• Warning Shadows: Home Alone with Classic Cinema (2010)
• Bing Crosby: Swinging on a Star - The War Years, 1940-1946 (2018)

Films

• 1987: Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker
• 1990: Masters of American Music: Satchmo - Louis Armstrong aka Satchmo
• 1999: Contributed to the documentary Barry Harris: The Spirit of Bebop. Giddins (& others) described how Harris developed and maintained an appreciation for Bebop and became a force to engage so many people in a deep love and commitment to music performance.
• 2000: Contributor of interviews throughout the 10-part PBS series Jazz by Ken Burns.
• 2014: Bing Crosby Rediscovered – American Masters

External links

• Gary Giddins at IMDb
• GaryGiddins.com (official website)