Face the Music
A Memoir
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
In this poignant memoir, the internationally celebrated bandleader reflects on family, illness, grief, and a bygone era of glamour, contemplating not just his career but the history of midcentury music and nightlife—and the enormously important role that the bandstand played in his life.
The internationally-famous bandleader Peter Duchin's six decades of performing have taken him to the most exclusive dance floors and concert halls in the world. He has played for presidents, kings, and queens, as well as for civil rights and cultural organizations. But in 2013, Duchin suffered a stroke that left him with limited use of his left hand, severely impacting his career.
Days of recuperating from his stroke—and later from a critical case of Covid-19—inspired Duchin to reconsider his complicated past. His father, the legendary bandleader Eddy Duchin, died when Peter was twelve; his mother, Marjorie Oelrichs Duchin, died when he was just six days old. In the succeeding decades, Duchin would follow his father to become the epitome of mid-20th Century glamour. But it was only half a century later, in the aftermath of his sudden illnesses, that he began to see his mother and father not just as the parents he never had, but as the people he never got to know; and at the same time, to reconsider the milieu in which he has been both a symbol and a participant.
More than a memoir, Face the Music offers a window into the era of debutantes and white-tie balls, when such events made national headlines. Duchin explores what “glamour” and “society” once meant, and what they mean now. With sincerity and humor, Face the Music offers a moving portrait of an extraordinary life, its disruptions, and revitalization.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The pianist leader of the Peter Duchin Orchestra dance band claws his way back from disability while reminiscing about his life in this knotty memoir. Duchin (Ghost of a Chance), who is also a mystery novelist, recounts his agonizing recovery from both a 2013 stroke that paralyzed his left hand and a harrowing battle with Covid-19, which included 47 days of intubation. There's a wintry edge to these recollections of struggling to salvage what he could from permanent decline—"I sat with both hands on the piano and tried to will my hand to pick up the message from my brain"—while commiserating with old friends. His recovery narrative frames reflections on his childhood and 60-year musical career that are by turns wry and heartfelt— often focused on parties where he was either a guest or entertainer—and include lots of celebrity cameos, from a youthful date with a luminous Audrey Hepburn to an improbable striptease performed by TV news monument Walter Cronkite. Infusing the meandering retrospective is an elegy to an older style of "society" entertainment, with its debutante balls and chic nightclubs, that his band continues to cater to as it dwindles in American culture. The result is a beguiling homage to jazz bands and the glamorous lifestyle they adorned.
