India, May 22 -- * For kids (and grown-ups looking for a quick catch-up)

Birth of the Cool: How Jazz Great Miles Davis Found His Sound (2019)

Think of Kathleen Cornell Berman's children's book as the gentlest introduction to jazz, and to the childhood and early life of Miles Davis. It follows the musician as a young boy - shy, standing out in band, but obsessed with beats, gospel choir, the radio and rhythm everywhere - as he learns to develop his own sound.

Berman's story flows in a kind of free verse, but keeps the more sordid details of Harlem nightlife out of the tale, ending with Davis, still in his 20s, at the 1955 Newport Jazz Festival (in a line-up that included the legends Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and Count Basie). The ...