Spirits Rejoice!: Jazz and American Religion

In Spirits Rejoice! Jason Bivins explores the relationship between American religion and American music, and the places where religion and jazz have overlapped.

Much writing about jazz tends toward glorified discographies or impressionistic descriptions of the actual sounds. Rather than providing a history, or series of biographical entries, Spirits Rejoice! takes to heart a central characteristic of jazz itself and improvises, generating a collection of
themes, pursuits, reoccurring foci, and interpretations. Bivins riffs on interviews, liner notes, journals, audience reception, and critical commentary, producing a work that argues for the centrality of religious experiences to any legitimate understanding of jazz, while also suggesting that jazz
opens up new interpretations of American religious history. Bivins examines themes such as musical creativity as related to specific religious traditions, jazz as a form of ritual and healing, and jazz cosmologies and metaphysics. Spirits Rejoice! connects Religious Studies to Jazz Studies through
thematic portraits, and a vast number of interviews to propose a new, improvisationally fluid archive for thinking about religion, race, and sound in the United States. Bivins's conclusions explore how the sound of spirits rejoicing challenges not only prevailing understandings of race and music,
but also the way we think about religion.

Spirits Rejoice! is an essential volume for any student of jazz, American religion, or American culture.


Author: Jason C. Bivins
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 05/01/2015
Pages: 392
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.40lbs
Size: 9.30h x 6.00w x 1.30d
ISBN: 9780190230913

Review Citation(s):
Booklist 03/01/2015 pg. 13
Library Journal 05/01/2015 pg. 74
Choice 09/01/2015

About the Author

Jason C. Bivins is Professor of Religious Studies at North Carolina State University and is an accomplished jazz guitarist.