Hugues Panassié was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 critic

Critic

A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...

 and producer

Record producer

A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...

. His most famous works were Hot Jazz: The Guide to Swing Music and The Real Jazz, published in 1936 and 1942, respectively.

He is also remembered for financing a number of jazz records by artists such as Sidney Bechet

Sidney Bechet

Sidney Bechet was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer.He was one of the first important soloists in jazz , and was perhaps the first notable jazz saxophonist...

 and Tommy Ladnier

Tommy Ladnier

Thomas J. "Tommy" Ladnier was an American jazz trumpeter. Clarinetist/writer Mezz Mezzrow rated him second only to Louis Armstrong....

.

Panassié was an admirer of the "hot" style of jazz music played by Louis Armstrong

Louis Armstrong

Louis Armstrong , nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana....

 in the 1930s. He famously dismissed bebop

Bebop

Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...

 as "a form of music distinct from jazz". He looked down upon West Coast jazz

West coast jazz

West Coast jazz refers to various styles of jazz music that developed around Los Angeles and San Francisco during the 1950s. West Coast jazz is often seen as a sub-genre of cool jazz, which featured a less frenetic, calmer style than bebop or hard bop. The music tended to be more heavily arranged,...

 as inauthentic, due to most musicians in the style being white.

Panassié was the founding president of the Hot Club de France (1932). During World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 he allegedly used records as a way to defy Nazi

Nazism

Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...

 authority in France. His friend, American Mezz Mezzrow

Mezz Mezzrow

Milton Mesirow, better known as Mezz Mezzrow was an American jazz clarinetist and saxophonist from Chicago, Illinois. Mezzrow is well known for organizing and financing historic recording sessions with Tommy Ladnier and Sidney Bechet. Mezzrow also recorded a number of times with Bechet and...

, describes one of Panassié's memorable achievements in his autobiography Really the Blues as follows:

"[The Nazi censor] was shown a record labeled La Tristesse de St. Louis, and Hugues explained helpfully that it was a sad song written about poor Louie the Fourteenth, lousy with that old French tradition. What the Kultur-hound didn't know was that underneath the phony label was a genuine Victor one, giving Louis Armstrong as the recording artist and stating the real name of the number -- St. Louis Blues."

He is also known for the quote, "when [Charlie Parker

Charlie Parker

Charles Parker, Jr. , famously called Bird or Yardbird, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer....

] developed what was called 'Bop,' he ceased to be a real jazz musician".

In 1956, RCA Victor published an LP record

LP record

The LP, or long-playing microgroove record, is a format for phonograph records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry...

, Guide to Jazz (LPM 1393), a compilation

Compilation album

A compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...

 including 16 recordings by prominent jazz artists with liner notes

Liner notes

Liner notes are the writings found in booklets which come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for vinyl records and cassettes.-Origin:...

by Panassiè.

Books

List of books Panassié wrote, or contributed to:

• Le Jazz Hot (1934)
• La musique de Jazz et le Swing (1943)
• Les rois du Jazz (1944)
• La véritable musique de Jazz (1946)
• Douze années de Jazz - Souvenirs (1946)
• Cinq mois à New York (1947)
• Jazz Panorama (1950)
• Quand Mezzrow enregistre (1952)
• Discographie critique des meilleurs disques de Jazz (1958)
• Histoire du vrai Jazz (1959)
• La bataille du Jazz (1965)
• Louis Armstrong (1969, Nouvelles Editions Latines}}
• Dictionnaire du Jazz (1971)