"Ake blends careful historical research with intelligent textual criticism and sophisticated cultural theory. . . His critiques augment and enhance our understanding and appreciation of great artistry, but they do much more. This is new, imaginative, original, and generative work. There are very few people who can write about both music theory and social theory with such clarity, depth, and insight."—George Lipsitz, author of Dangerous Crossroads: Popular Music, Postmodernism and the Poetics of Place
"David Ake is a jazz artist who has woodshedded with his critical theory as much as with his instrument. As an astute commentator on a wide range of jazz subjects, he has the virtuosity of an Art Tatum and the eclecticism of a John Zorn."—Krin Gabbard, author of Jammin' at the Margins: Jazz and the American Cinema
"David Ake's writing combines the best of modern scholarship with the no-nonsense attitude of a gigging musician. In Jazz Cultures, he seizes upon precisely those issues and historical moments that best reveal how jazz studies might mature into something worthy of the music. A wonderful antidote to the usual cliches of jazz history and a splendid debut."—Scott DeVeaux, author of The Birth of Bebop
"Ake offers an engaging and eclectic alternative to much jazz studies fare by examining seldom-considered subjects and reading familiar ones through unconventional means. I came away from Jazz Matters knowing that I had learned something new regarding the practices of writing about, listening to, and playing jazz."―Eric Porter, author of What Is This Thing Called Jazz?
"Smart, interesting, engaging, thoughtful, and stimulating, this book opens up a lot of what we often take for granted about jazz. A fitting sequel to Jazz Cultures, Jazz Matters will no doubt be just as important to jazz scholarship."―Gabriel Solis, author of Monk's Music: Thelonious Monk and Jazz History in the Making
"Jazz Matters is intellectually stimulating as much as emotionally involving. It deals with sides of the acts of creating jazz and listening to it that were hitherto little or no discussed, and does it with first-hand knowledge, empathy, and a wide range of references to literature, philosophy and art, adding something deeply valuable at the vast literature on jazz currently available."―Francesco Martinelli, Director of Centro Studi sul Jazz "Arrigo Polillo" - Fondazione Siena Jazz
“A sterling collection of writings to discuss the transient topic of jazz and its moving-target definitions. . . . As a whole, the essayists deliver content that is laser-focused on the book's title, and there are no misfires. This collection will be useful for decades to come. . . . Highly recommended.”—G. A. Akkerman, University of South Carolina Upstate Choice
"it will be interesting to observe the impact that this collection of unusual, entertaining and thought-provoking perspectives has on jazz studies."—Alison Eales Popular Music
“Jazz/Not Jazz is an innovative and inspiring investigation of jazz as it is practiced, theorized and taught today. Taking their cues from current debates within jazz scholarship, the contributors to this collection open up jazz studies to a transdisciplinarity that is rich in its diversity of approaches, candid in its appraisals of critical worth, transparent in its ideological suppositions, and catholic in its subjects/objects of inquiry.”—Kevin Fellezs, author of Birds of Fire: Jazz, Rock, Funk and the Creation of Fusion.
“This collection is a delight. Each essay opens up some previously ignored aspect of jazz history. Anyone who knows the New Jazz Studies and is wise enough to acquire this book will immediately devour it.”—Krin Gabbard, author of Hotter Than That: The Trumpet, Jazz, and American Culture.