Orfeo ...Sextet ...dancing about architecture.

[alice malice]

Writing about music," the saying goes, "is like dancing about
architecture." If it's meant to dissuade, the warning has gone
unheeded: Over the years, a number of novels about music have
ingeniously translated this notoriously languageless experience into
English. In rock novels or the burgeoning genre of lit-hop, most of
the action happens to non-musicians—the listeners populating record
stores, high schools, the streets. The primary focus of the jazz
novel, however, is the musicians themselves. No other form pays as
much attention to the players, their instruments, and the music as it
is being performed. The musicians found in the following books—a
trumpeter, a pianist, a drummer, a saxophonist, a bassist, and a
vocalist—form a sort of sextet. Each solos on themes endemic to the
genre: racism and heroism, virtuosic talent and ruined ambition. Like
a set of jazz standards, the tune can be familiar; the execution
rarely is.

http://www.bookforum.com/booklist/13699
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Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l