What do you think?
Rate this book
All in Good Time: A Memoir
All in Good Time is a luminous memoir about growing up in the shadow of the golden age of songwriting and Sinatra, from the celebrated radio personality and novelist Jonathan Schwartz.
“Dancing in the Dark.” “That’s Entertainment.” “By Myself.” “You and the Night and the Music.” They are part of the American Songbook, and were all composed by Arthur Schwartz, the elusive father at the center of his son’s beautifully written book.
Imagine a childhood in which Judy Garland sings you lullabies, Jackie Robinson hits you fly balls, and yet you’re lonely enough to sneak into the houses of Beverly Hills neighbors and hide behind curtains to watch real families at dinner.
At the age of nine, Jonathan Schwartz began broadcasting his father’s songs on a homemade radio station, and would eventually perform those songs, and others, as a pianist-singer in the saloons of London and Paris, meeting Frank Sinatra for the first time along the way. (His portrait of Sinatra is as affectionate and accurate as any written to date.)
Schwartz’s love for a married woman caught up in the fervor of the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and his other relationships with both lovers and wives, surround his eventually successful career on New York radio.
The men and women who have roles to play include Richard Rodgers, Nelson Riddle, Carly Simon, Jimmy Van Heusen, Bennett Cerf, Elizabeth Taylor, and, of course, Sinatra himself.
Schwartz writes of the start of FM radio, the inception of the LP, and the constantly changing flavors of popular music, while revealing the darker corners of his own history.
Most of all, Jonathan Schwartz embraces the legacy his father left a passion for music, honored with both pride and sorrow.
“Dancing in the Dark.” “That’s Entertainment.” “By Myself.” “You and the Night and the Music.” They are part of the American Songbook, and were all composed by Arthur Schwartz, the elusive father at the center of his son’s beautifully written book.
Imagine a childhood in which Judy Garland sings you lullabies, Jackie Robinson hits you fly balls, and yet you’re lonely enough to sneak into the houses of Beverly Hills neighbors and hide behind curtains to watch real families at dinner.
At the age of nine, Jonathan Schwartz began broadcasting his father’s songs on a homemade radio station, and would eventually perform those songs, and others, as a pianist-singer in the saloons of London and Paris, meeting Frank Sinatra for the first time along the way. (His portrait of Sinatra is as affectionate and accurate as any written to date.)
Schwartz’s love for a married woman caught up in the fervor of the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and his other relationships with both lovers and wives, surround his eventually successful career on New York radio.
The men and women who have roles to play include Richard Rodgers, Nelson Riddle, Carly Simon, Jimmy Van Heusen, Bennett Cerf, Elizabeth Taylor, and, of course, Sinatra himself.
Schwartz writes of the start of FM radio, the inception of the LP, and the constantly changing flavors of popular music, while revealing the darker corners of his own history.
Most of all, Jonathan Schwartz embraces the legacy his father left a passion for music, honored with both pride and sorrow.
- GenresMemoirNonfiction
304 pages, Paperback
First published March 2, 2004
5 people are currently reading
28 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
September 5, 2020
Fantastic book. A lovely examination of humanity and its relation to art and love. Longtime listener of theJonathanstation.org, which I also highly recommend.
July 17, 2024
If you were a WNEW radio fan, you will like this book. There is a lot of name dropping, but Jonno is a great storyteller. His struggles with and evident love of his father, a celebrated composer and part of the American Songbook is touching. Worth the read.
March 2, 2017
It's always sad to me when I finish my last book of the summer. And I ended it with a random memoir by Jonathan Schwartz that I stole from a friend's office about 5 years ago. (Thanks McPaul).
Schwartz is a big radio presence in New York, currently hosting weekend afternoons on WNYC where he plays music from the Great American Songbook: Porter, Gershwin, Basie, Sinatra, Ella... and the author's father, composer Arthur Schwartz who wrote many hit songs including "Dancing in the Dark" and "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan".
Those personalities all show up in Schwartz's childhood, which, besides being rather glamorous, is about as messed up as you can imagine. His writing style is elaborate, poetic, riff-y, like a jazz musician, and it took me a while to get into the rhythm of his voice. But once I did, the stories, the personalities, and the details kept me hooked. I'm sure I'll listen to his radio show now with a new perspective.
I'd give this book 3 1/2 stars for writing, 4 stars for content.
Schwartz is a big radio presence in New York, currently hosting weekend afternoons on WNYC where he plays music from the Great American Songbook: Porter, Gershwin, Basie, Sinatra, Ella... and the author's father, composer Arthur Schwartz who wrote many hit songs including "Dancing in the Dark" and "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan".
Those personalities all show up in Schwartz's childhood, which, besides being rather glamorous, is about as messed up as you can imagine. His writing style is elaborate, poetic, riff-y, like a jazz musician, and it took me a while to get into the rhythm of his voice. But once I did, the stories, the personalities, and the details kept me hooked. I'm sure I'll listen to his radio show now with a new perspective.
I'd give this book 3 1/2 stars for writing, 4 stars for content.
February 11, 2013
As a New Yorker of a certain age, I've shared a good part of my life with Jonathan Schwartz. We both love Frank Sinatra and the Great American Songbook. Over the years he has shared with me some wonderful anecdotes and given freely of his encyclopedic knowledge of this genre.
You don't have to be a Jonathan Schwartz fan to enjoy the book though. It is well written and filled with larger than life characters, many of whom you know.
Well done, Jonathan!
You don't have to be a Jonathan Schwartz fan to enjoy the book though. It is well written and filled with larger than life characters, many of whom you know.
Well done, Jonathan!
April 4, 2022
It's hard to write a balanced review of this unbalanced memoir when you're as obsessed with Jonathan Schwartz as I am. A dedicated listener for years to his show on WNYC, I full-on wrote the man a poem inspired by his Lucy story. I was delighted to come across this memoir - and will try to review it fairly.
Simply, the man can write - and has a pen-tip for nostalgia and how songs and being loved intertwined in his incredible life. Son of a great songwriter, Schwartz rubbed elbows with the greats, Judy Garland, Jackie Robinson, Lerner, Lowe, Hammerstein, and the rest before he reached the double digits.
The beginning of this memoir is fabulous - possibly the best I've read - as it touches upon those years, the love for his father and mother, and his budding interest in broadcast. There are poignant moments so tenderly touched, tears came to my eyes. This part of the memoir was a five.
The rest of it is a bit unbalanced. Braiding in his obsessive baseball trivia glossed my eyes over a bit, while his drinking man bravado allowed him to vaguely watercolor his life with women of varying degrees of importance. Simply, the first third of the book is stellar - the second - with the Sinatra stuff and broadcast stuff, is interesting, and the baseball and casual loves of his life was fine- but all three didn't braid together too well.
I wished it as a better balanced and more focused memoir - but the writing is off the hook and there are little tidbits of entertainment history braided in with the wistful love of a son for his father. I'm unsure what you'd make of it if you didn't know the man, but this just deepens my love for him.
Simply, the man can write - and has a pen-tip for nostalgia and how songs and being loved intertwined in his incredible life. Son of a great songwriter, Schwartz rubbed elbows with the greats, Judy Garland, Jackie Robinson, Lerner, Lowe, Hammerstein, and the rest before he reached the double digits.
The beginning of this memoir is fabulous - possibly the best I've read - as it touches upon those years, the love for his father and mother, and his budding interest in broadcast. There are poignant moments so tenderly touched, tears came to my eyes. This part of the memoir was a five.
The rest of it is a bit unbalanced. Braiding in his obsessive baseball trivia glossed my eyes over a bit, while his drinking man bravado allowed him to vaguely watercolor his life with women of varying degrees of importance. Simply, the first third of the book is stellar - the second - with the Sinatra stuff and broadcast stuff, is interesting, and the baseball and casual loves of his life was fine- but all three didn't braid together too well.
I wished it as a better balanced and more focused memoir - but the writing is off the hook and there are little tidbits of entertainment history braided in with the wistful love of a son for his father. I'm unsure what you'd make of it if you didn't know the man, but this just deepens my love for him.
July 4, 2013
Took close to a year to finish this book. I began it last year in the Adirondacks during my summer-vacation-memoir spree. Same love/hate feeling that I have when listening to his radio show. Anecdotes are fascinating and bring back memories of the music world in NYC, but Schwartz' continual self-aggrandizement is exhausting. However, I do have to admit, he is a great storyteller both on air and in print. Glad I stuck it out.
Read
May 21, 2011I've been enchanted by the radio presentations of Mr. Schwartz across four decades, and have always wondered as to the source of his bottomless knowledge and passion for music of all genres (especially The Great American Songbook -- a shared passion). A quarter of the way through his memoir, it's all very clear...
July 14, 2008
A fascinating memoir from my favorite radio host.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews