BOOK LAUNCH | Statesman of the Piano: Jazz, Race, and History in the Life of Lou Hooper

DETAILS AND REGISTRATION:

Please join co-editors Sean Mills, Eric Fillion, and Désirée Rochat for the launch of Statesman of the Piano: Jazz, Race, and History in the Life of Lou Hooper. 

Broom Factory 305 Rideau Street Kingston

For more information: https://www.queensu.ca/history/news-and-events/events/statesman-of-the-piano-book-launch

Join us for a conversation between the co-editors and the panelists: 

Karen Dubinsky (Global Development Studies - History) 

Kristin Moriah (English) 

Daniel McNeil (Queen's National Scholar Chair in Black Studies - History) 

with members of Lou Hooper's family

There will also be samples of Hooper's music along with refreshments to enjoy. Copies of Statesman of the Piano will be available for purchase.

Sean Mills is Canada Research Chair in Canadian and Transnational History at the University of Toronto. He is the author of The Empire Within: Postcolonial Thought and Political Activism in Sixties Montreal and A Place in the Sun: Haiti, Haitians, and the Remaking of Quebec.

Eric Fillion is adjunct professor and Buchanan Postdoctoral Fellow in Canadian history at Queen’s University. He is the author of JAZZ LIBRE et la révolution québécoise: Musique-action, 1967-1975 and Distant Stage: Quebec, Brazil, and the Making of Canada’s Cultural Diplomacy.

Désirée Rochat is a postdoctoral fellow at the Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling at Concordia University.

about the book

Ontario-born jazz pianist Lou Hooper (1894-1977) began his professional career in Detroit, accompanying blues singers such as Ma Rainey at the legendary Koppin Theatre. In 1921 he moved to Harlem, performing alongside Paul Robeson and recording extensively in and around Tin Pan Alley, before moving to Montreal in the 1930s.

Prolific and influential, Hooper was an early teacher of Oscar Peterson and deeply involved in the jazz community in Montreal. When the Second World War broke out he joined the Canadian Armed Forces and entertained the troops in Europe. Near the end of his life Hooper came to prominence for his exceptional career and place in the history of jazz, inspiring an autobiography that was never published. Statesman of the Piano makes this document widely available for the first time and includes photographs, concert programs, lyrics, and other documents to reconstruct his life and times. Historians, archivists, musicians, and cultural critics provide annotations and commentary, examining some of the themes that emerge from Hooper’s writing and music.

Statesman of the Piano sparks new conversations about Hooper’s legacy while shedding light on the cross-border travels and wartime experiences of Black musicians, the politics of archiving and curating, and the connections between race and music in the twentieth century.