The latest Beach Boys book is another album-centered short selection in the 33 1/3 series entitled Smile, by musicologist Luis Sanchez, a native of West Texas, near my home state of New Mexico. The credentials Mr. Sanchez brings to this book are strong, and his love of Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys music is indisputable. Mr. Sanchez brings a view of Smile's music in the more macro context of The Beach Boys' evolution and development, up to the scrapping of Smile in the wake of Brian Wilson's rapid growth as an all around musician and performer.
The first important point to make is that this book is not going to satisfy the rabid obsessive who frequents the Smile netherworld, dissecting the music Brian Wilson created so long ago. In that sense, caveat emptor.....but, Mr. Sanchez slowly builds a case for The Beach Boys' music being unique, genuine, and seasoned with a healthy degree of humor. In recounting the lead-up to Smile's Sixties demise, the author recounts how the optimism and humor in Brian Wilson's music built upon the history and traditions of American Popular Music that transcends the Rock oeurve. This quality, evident in Brian's use of Stephen Foster and The Gershwin Brothers as a melodic basis for some of his productions outside of The Beach Boys, is one of the strands of Brian's music that the author mentions as helping Brian fall within the greater tradition of American Popular Music.
Another admirable aspect of Mr. Sanchez's is his thorough literature review leading up to his writing of this brief but informative overview of Beach Boys' music. The casual reader has a treasure trove of references for readers new to the world of Beach Boys' critical reading. His reliance upon David Leaf's Beach Boys and the California Myth tends to obscure further critical writing that has occurred since that 1979 work, revised in 1985. The details of some of Mr. Sanchez's points are hindered by some minor inaccuracies in research, but this is a fine read for newcomers to the Beach Boys' music and historical literature.
To summarize, Mr. Sanchez's thesis of placing Brian Wilson's music in the broader context of American Popular Music, and seeing Rock Music as a subset of it, is a very welcome and positive point of view. In this sense, Brian's body of work stands alongside such giants of American Music as Stephen Foster, The Gershwins, Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Lorenz Hart, and contemporaries who have written for screen and stage. Brian's last honor that he has not received is The Library of Congress's Gershwin Award, and such recognition would be appropriate, given his influence on American Music in the last half century.
Text copyright 2014 by Peter Reum-All rights reserved
The first important point to make is that this book is not going to satisfy the rabid obsessive who frequents the Smile netherworld, dissecting the music Brian Wilson created so long ago. In that sense, caveat emptor.....but, Mr. Sanchez slowly builds a case for The Beach Boys' music being unique, genuine, and seasoned with a healthy degree of humor. In recounting the lead-up to Smile's Sixties demise, the author recounts how the optimism and humor in Brian Wilson's music built upon the history and traditions of American Popular Music that transcends the Rock oeurve. This quality, evident in Brian's use of Stephen Foster and The Gershwin Brothers as a melodic basis for some of his productions outside of The Beach Boys, is one of the strands of Brian's music that the author mentions as helping Brian fall within the greater tradition of American Popular Music.
Another admirable aspect of Mr. Sanchez's is his thorough literature review leading up to his writing of this brief but informative overview of Beach Boys' music. The casual reader has a treasure trove of references for readers new to the world of Beach Boys' critical reading. His reliance upon David Leaf's Beach Boys and the California Myth tends to obscure further critical writing that has occurred since that 1979 work, revised in 1985. The details of some of Mr. Sanchez's points are hindered by some minor inaccuracies in research, but this is a fine read for newcomers to the Beach Boys' music and historical literature.
To summarize, Mr. Sanchez's thesis of placing Brian Wilson's music in the broader context of American Popular Music, and seeing Rock Music as a subset of it, is a very welcome and positive point of view. In this sense, Brian's body of work stands alongside such giants of American Music as Stephen Foster, The Gershwins, Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Lorenz Hart, and contemporaries who have written for screen and stage. Brian's last honor that he has not received is The Library of Congress's Gershwin Award, and such recognition would be appropriate, given his influence on American Music in the last half century.
Text copyright 2014 by Peter Reum-All rights reserved
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