Jazz Odyssey

Booker T. Pittman (1909-1969) was a jazz saxophonist and clarinetist who played with greats like Louis Armstrong and Count Basie in the 1920s and 1930s. The maternal grandson of Booker T. Washington, Pittman was tremendously talented and ambitious like his famous grandfather. After starring in local jazz scenes as an alto saxophonist and clarinetist in Kansas City, Harlem, and Paris, in the late 1920s and mid-1930s, Pittman boarded a ship to South America and remained there until his death in 1969. In Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Buenos Aires, and Montevideo, he became a fixture of casinos and nightclubs, a pioneer of the South American musical diaspora, and a formative figure of several jazz scenes. He also struggled mightily with drugs and alcohol, and on more than one occasion disappeared into the Brazilian and Uruguayan backlands. Ultimately, though, he returned to sobriety, stability, and the spotlight, fulfilling his potential in Brazil in the 1950s and 1960s.

Jazz Odyssey: The Global Lives of Booker T. Pittman combines accessible music analysis with global cultural history, while telling a compelling story of a figure whose life spanned some of the most celebrated—and also some of the most obscure—chapters in jazz history. Based on extensive archival research but written for the general audience, Jazz Odyssey will appeal equally to jazz fans and scholars, as well as readers interested in a fascinating family saga that includes the stories of Pittman’s wife Ofélia and stepdaughter Eliana, who is herself a notable singer and actress.

Author Biography

Jason Borge is professor of Latin American literary and cultural studies at University of Texas at Austin. He is author of Tropical Riffs: Latin America and the Politics of Jazz and Latin American Writers and the Rise of Hollywood Cinema. His work has appeared in such publications as the Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies, Hispanic Review, Afro-Hispanic Review, and Luso-Brazilian Review, among others.