have you ever had something that you wanted that was rare or hard to find? where whenever you go to certain stores or places you have to look for it even though you know it's probably not gonna happen? that was me with the rare out-of-print book below; The First Book of Jazz by Langston Hughes. This version (the first version published by Franklin Watts) is nearly impossible to find unless you happen to see it on the internet for $100 and up. There is a different, newer publishing co that sells this on amazon for around $50 but the cover is different and not as good! It became a sort of small obsession over the last few months where everytime i stopped at a thrift store i would have to scour over the books just in case i would get lucky (which is actually how i found all those great classic books i blogged about earlier).
anyway, a few mornings ago, on jeremiah's day off, we wanted to go to zia records and get the new black keys lp that had just come out. so we grabbed a few old records to trade in and remembering that one zia location also takes books we rounded up some that were dusting away on our shelves. while we waited for them to sort through our stuff, we did what we always do...jeremiah went to the records and i, with my small obsession, went to check out the music section of the books. i quickly scanned over the area about jazz and didnt see what i was hoping for but then looked again. low and behold there she was... small and modest with that orange binding tucked in between the larger books. i took the photo below with my phone to show why i didnt see it on the first glance. curious how much they were asking for it, i turned it over to see that the price tag said $4.99. $4.99 that's it? are you kidding me?? i walked... no more like paced over to jeremiah, slapped the book down in front of him and said, 'look what i found!' a few minutes later they finally called his name for the trade credit which was enough to pay for the lp (score!) and when we got up to the counter jeremiah remembered that he had a discount left on his card...which made the grand total for the book $1.87. And it is here that i will note that before we had left that morning he had found $2.00 in the pocket of his jeans...BAM!
here are some photos of the incredible illustrations inside. he gives all the history of how and where it all started as well as his 100 favorite jazz, blues, folk etc. songs which i totally appreciate!
