LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING

A tribute to “one of the architects of jazz.”

This is the first-ever collection that showcases Schlitten’s incredible career as a legendary jazz producer, photographer of jazz artists, and album-cover designer. The book includes rare black-and-white and color photos of jazz greats, 25 album covers that he designed, a biographical essay by jazz journalist Ted Panken, and an introduction by the acclaimed record producer Zev Feldman—not to mention a Harvey Pekar American Splendor comic riff of Schlitten from 1991. For jazz lovers, this is bounty indeed. Panken goes into great detail chronicling Schlitten’s career, describing specific jazz sessions that Schlitten, born in 1932, attended and photographed, like his early shoot of Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane in 1957. As more of his production work was recognized, he took on all kinds of significant projects. He became involved in bringing back old recordings from the 1930s and ’40s for new audiences. In the 1970s, he started his own label, Xanadu, releasing 111 albums, paying royalties whenever he could. Schlitten’s second wife, Nina, urged him to form the label. “Start your own company; I’ll work with you,” she said. “So we started it with $10,000,” Schlitten recalls. “She did all the legal work, did all the secretarial work, and got up early in the morning to pack records, if we were lucky.” One of Schlitten’s final Xanadu productions was Billy Eckstine—I Want to Talk About You: Original 1940-1945 Recordings. Among the book’s many photos is a moody black-and-white image of Coltrane, Monk, and Shadow Wilson performing in 1957. And there’s one of Sonny Rollins and his sax at the Art Gallery. Also featured are Mahalia Jackson, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis, Ron Carter, and Frank Sinatra. As Feldman writes, Schlitten “witnessed history being made on a nightly basis.”

A sumptuous collection of visual jazz history.