Crosby biographer reviews crooner’s career

Crosby biographer Gary Giddens (second from left) with (from left) Wilson Braun, head of the University of Delaware Library Associates, Susan Brynteson, May Morris Director of Libraries, and Robert Harra of Wilmington Trust

5:32 p.m., May 6, 2005--Award-winning author Gary Giddins discussed the early years of singer/actor Bing Crosby’s career at the University of Delaware Library Associates annual dinner in Wilmington.

The event, sponsored by Wilmington Trust Co., was held May 3, in Arsht Hall, on UD’s Wilmington campus.

The crooner extraordinaire, who is perhaps most remembered today for his version of Irving Berlin’s classic holiday hit “White Christmas,” is the focus of Giddins’ book, Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams: The Early Years, 1903-1940 (2002). In the biography, Giddins follows the career of the man he describes as “the first pop singer superstar, 15 years before Frank Sinatra.”

A recipient of the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism and two Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Awards, Giddins also has received five ASCAP-Deems Taylor Awards, a George Foster Peabody Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Books by Giddins include Visions of Jazz: The First Century; Satchmo: The Genius of Louis Armstorng; Riding on a Blue Note: Jazz and American Pop; and Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker.

Photo by Jon Cox

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