Very Young Musician

by Jill Krementz and Krementz

Book Overview

Ten-year-old Josh Broder describes many of the activities in his life that are connected to his study of the trumpet. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671726870
• ISBN13: 9780671726874
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
• Length: 48 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 8.2" x 11.2"
• Age Range: 9 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 4 to 7

Customer Reviews

Broder! A boy and his trumpet: Best Friends Forever

Jill Krementz's A Very Young Musician is an astounding and heartbreaking tale of a young man and his relationship with the trumpet. The book is a work of art--an astounding achievement in breaking the fourth wall between the world and the book's subject, Josh Broder. Mr. Broder is obviously an extremely seasoned and well regarded master--an 11 year old savant, a prodigy almost as unmatched in his abilities as he is his own mind. Krementz's research is thorough and well stated. The book not only explores Joshua's life as a leading young musician, but also his role in larger world affairs. There are photos of Josh marching with various bands, expanding U.S. trade margins while posing stylishly in acid washed jeans, and teaching Wynton Marsalis how to wale on one particularly touch riff. In the photo caption it is explained that the young Josh greeted Mr. Marsalis by saying "What up homeslice?" This amused and delighted readers of all generations and backgrounds. The book also includes a candid discussion of Joshua's romantic entanglements. For an 11 year old he was known as quite the Lothario. As one former girlfriend puts it, "he's just... so dreamy." In a classic homage to the early Indiana Jones films, another girlfriend went so far as to write 'I love you' on her eyelids. "That's weird," says Josh when informed of this move. "And kind of creepy." "The girls are all on me yo yo! Why they frontin'?" Asks one of Josh's back up dancers. Josh goes on to expand on this thought, and closes the book with an impressively technical explanation. "I hear that trumpet players are better kisses," Josh explains. "At least that what my girlfriends tell me." All in all I would have to give this book five stars. It is an insightful and bully good look into the life of a truly great American. It waxes poetic on the existential meaning of the early 1990s, and acts as a literary meeting ground; somewhere between "The Royal Tannenbaums" and "The Big Lebowski".