Goodbye: In Search of Gordon Jenkins

by Bruce Jenkins

Goodbye combines biography with a son's discovery of his father. Gordon Jenkins, one of America's most significant musical figures throughout his 50-year career, collaborated with many of the major talents in postwar pop and jazz. Modest by nature, he rarely spoke of his accomplishments, and there was much to discover when, on account of his father's death in 1984, Bruce Jenkins began his research. Paralleling the story of Gordon Jenkins's personal life is a veritable history of popular music, featuring luminaries from Irving Berlin to Billie Holiday. This richly anecdotal biography relates a wealth of heretofore untold stories of his encounters with icons like Sinatra, who was uncharacteristically awestruck by him, and Judy Garland, whom only Jenkins could convince to go onstage when she was crippled with anxiety. A concluding chapter documents Jenkins's slow, difficult death from ALS, leaving readers with an unforgettable image of a legend dying with dignity and unexpected good humor.

Genres: Biography

341 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2005

About the author

Bruce Jenkins, a San Francisco Chronicle columnist twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, is the author of "Goodbye: In Search of Gordon Jenkins," "Shop Around: Growing Up With Motown in a Sinatra Household," "North Shore Chronicles: Big-Wave Surfing in Hawaii," and " A Good Man: The Pete Newell Story."

A 1966 graduate of Santa Monica High School, he earned a B.A. in journalistic studies at UC Berkeley in 1971 and has written for the San Francisco Chronicle since 1973, writing a regular sports column since 1989. He has covered 27 World Series and 19 Wimbledons, and been named one of the top 10 sports columnists in the nation by the Associated Press Sports Editors.

Reviews

[Russ Bertetta · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book is really written for a hard core music fan of the 40's and 50's as well as someone who knows a lot about the structures of music. I'm neither but know a little. Man with an interesting life.