If you’re looking to know the history of Jazz in India, ‘Taj Mahal Foxtrot: A Story of Bombay’s Jazz Age’ by Naresh Fernandes is a must read. With a wealth of information and packaged with a free audio CD of six original jazz recordings of the time, Fernandes’ narrative in the book is not only well researched, but very exhaustive while talking about the artists in the book.

This book tells a story of the city of Bombay through the lives of those who left homes in far off places like New Orleans, Chicago, Mozambique and closer afield like Goa and Karachi came to Bombay the city of dreams, to play music in restaurants and hotels, music for Bollywood movies and thereby make a name for themselves. You had jazz musicians like Teddy Weatherford, Crickett Smith, Toni Pinto, Anthony Gonsalves – whose name was used in the song My Name is Anthony Gonsalves; from the Hindi film ‘Amar, Akbar, Anthony’. You also had trumpeter Chic Chocolate, who was known as the Louis Armstrong of India; Goan trumpet player Frank Fernand, saxophonist Micky Correa. These musicians and many others were the backbone of the music industry then, who was responsible for influencing Hindi film music in later years.

Fernandes has painstakingly gone through the hard word of archiving old pictures and using illustrations that match the narrative well. His book that took almost eight years to complete is an encyclopedia for young jazz enthusiasts who would want to trace the history of this American based genre and its Indian soundtrack.

‘Taj Mahal Foxtrot’ won the Dr Ashok Ranade Memorial Award and the Shakti Bhatt First Book Prize.

Fernandes has previously served as editor –in-chief of Time Out India and has also worked at the Times of India, the Associated Press in Mumbai and The Wall Street Journal in New York. His work has been published in various newspapers and magazines in India and overseas.

Fernandes is also the author of ‘City Adrift: A Short Biography of Bombay’ (Aleph, 2013), and co author of ‘Bombay Then and Mumbai Now’ (Roli, 2009) and co editor with Jerry Pinto of ‘Bombay Meri Jaan’ (Penguin). Fernandes is presently the Editor of Scroll.in a digital daily.

The stories that didn’t make it to the book can be found on his website, www.tajmahalfoxtrot.com. The site also hosts a section of rare archival music, of Indian swing bands from the 40s and 50s and also videos. It also has interviews with the author, press and celeb reviews/quotes of the book and jazz music stories by various authors.

Reviewed by Verus Ferreira