q speaks to Fong-Torres tonight in s.f.
Q will speak with veteran music journalist Ben Fong-Torres and sign copies of his acclaimed new coffee table book, The Complete Quincy Jones: My Journey & Passions , tonight (December 16) at 8 p.m. at Herbst Theatre in San Francisco. You can find more information about the event here.
Fong-Torres, like Quincy, had his likeness portrayed by an actor in a major motion picture. Best known of his tenure at Rolling Stone magazine from 1969 through 1981, Fong-Torres’ character was portrayed by actor Terry Chen in the 2000 film Almost Famous, writer-director Cameron Crowe’s semi-autobiographical account of his rise as a young rock journalist. Quincy was portrayed by actor Larenz Tate in 2004’s Ray, the biopic of Q’s longtime friend and musical collaborator Ray Charles.
With Fong-Torres reportedly at work on a new Quincy book, you can bet tonight’s discussion will be lively.
On Wednesday (December 17) at 7 p.m., Quincy has a second Northern California book signing at Book Passage in Corte Madera, California, north of San Francisco. You can find more information here.
Below you can check out the latest installment of The Quincy Jones Show podcast, shot at Quincy’s recent book signing at Barnes & Noble in Santa Monica, California. In the footage, Quincy is interviewed by noted music journalist Don Heckman, known for his writing in the Los Angeles Times and Jazz Times.
I received my copy of your book over the weekend. Your publisher fedex it to me. I was so excited by the book. It is gorgeous, and beautifully laid out. I am truly enjoying it. For Christmas, I am buying copies for my parents who too are fans of yours. But as I read through the pages and look at those lovely pics. It just brought me to tears. Now I am a grown man, and I could not understand why I was drippin from the face. The pages not only captured your history but mine as well. Because I grew up on your music and in my younger years I wanted to be a composer and producer just like you. When Listen Up and Back On The Block came out I figured that I could do the same thing on a local level. Combining local musicians with young and yet to be musicians together for a project. Everybody like the idea but one thing held it up MONEY. One day I will completed that task. Currently I haved worked with the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame and the Deborah Brown Community School to get the ball rolling. It is really hard to get the kids from the inner city to get involved beacuse you have a piano gutiar or even a violin competing with a DJ’s turntable. What a truly amazing journey that you have traveled. Today I brought your book so that the children at the charter school could see for themselves your body of work. To see these kids eyes light up as they carefully flipped through the pages of your book, it was a magic moment for me. I will post the pics so you can see the kids. I am looking foward to the interview.
J.
Kavin Ross