Will Friedwald's jazz universe

The universe contained between the covers of Will Friedwald's book, "A Biographical Guide to the Great Jazz and Pop Singers," is vast enough to contain not merely multitudes, but opposites, anomalies, curiosities and, of course, demigods. The latter, as you would expect from a book of such scope and ambition, include Crosby and Sinatra (as if we need their first names), Billie and Ella (as if we need their last names), Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett, Anita O'Day, Dinah Washington, Billy Eckstine, Peggy Lee and, the father of them all, Louis Armstrong.

So far, so familiar. Friedwald's reputation as one of the more eclectic and discriminating enthusiasts of 20th century American popular music has been solidly established by such books as "Jazz Singing" (1992), "Sinatra! The Song is You" (1997), "Stardust Melodies: A Biography of 12 of America's Most Popular Songs" (2002), along with scores of liner notes and reviews. One expects that, having proven his mettle at writing the life stories of songs, he would throw himself into near-definitive word portraits of the aforementioned artists. Much in the manner of David Thomson's influential "Biographical Dictionary of Film" (which this book claims, without apology, as a model), Friedwald's profiles are idiosyncratic, subjective and, as with the most resonant of ballads, sharply tinged with tone, tension and mood.

Those familiar with Friedwald's unusually broad field of vision won't be surprised by his often-shrewd advocacy of singers that casual-to-finicky fans may not consider part of the classic pop pantheon. If you think Pearl Bailey, Jimmy Durante and Martha Raye were little more than comic actors with brassy personas and big mouths, if you can only judge Perry Como, Dinah Shore or Dean Martin by what they did on their TV variety shows, if you have trouble imagining why Buddy Greco, Jack Jones, Patti Page or Doris Day matter as much in this firmament as Abbey Lincoln, Lee Wiley, Rosemary Clooney and Johnny Hartman, then Friedwald is more than happy to set you straight. This book was born to settle as many arguments as it starts.

But Friedwald isn't content with merely having the next-to-last word on Kay Starr, Louis Prima, Blossom Dearie and Mahalia Jackson. No, sir, he's going to make your head spin off your neck by bringing in from the catacombs such crooners as Russ Columbo, Nick "Tiptoe Thru the Tulips" Lucas and Cliff "Ukulele Ike" Edwards, best remembered these days (maybe) as the voice of Jiminy Cricket. And then, he really runs wild along the edges, bringing in for close scrutiny such myriad figures as Josephine Baker, Herb Jeffries, Dorothy Lamour, Shirley Temple, Noël Coward, Hank Williams, Julie Andrews, Johnny Mathis, Andy Williams, Bob Dylan (whom he persuasively places within the context of great Jewish-American tunesmiths), Sam Cooke, Hadda Brooks and (wait for it) Robert Goulet. At which point, you're ready to say, with some compound of exhaustion and sarcasm, "While you're at it, bring in Jerry Colonna, Gale Storm and Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer from The Little Rascals, why don't you?" Knowing Friedwald, he probably considered all of them.

It finally occurs to you that in a book so heavily laden with stars of varying magnitude, the real star of "A Biographical Guide to the Great Jazz and Pop Singers" is Friedwald's obsession itself, which one imagines to be a massive, glowing entity prepared to consume everything in its path. At times, even Friedwald can be overbearing, especially when his humor gallops too far ahead of his thought. (In his entry on Peggy Lee, he cites Shirley Horn's homage to her at a memorial concert as a "high-Lee-inspired rendition of 'Folks Who Live on the Hill.' " Really, man?) In the end, though, you forgive him his excesses because they emerge from the same passionate devotion that is able to allow so many different voices to exist in the same continuum. Anyone who can't imagine, much less enjoy, living in such a universe as Friedwald's can't possibly enjoy living, period.

A BIOGRAPHICAL GUIDE TO THE GREAT JAZZ AND POP SINGERS, by Will Friedwald. Pantheon Books. 811 pp., $45.