Dream Boogie

Critical Praise

"Guralnick, as in his biography of Elvis Presley, displays a feel for the culture that gave rise to the musician, and his account is a revelatory portrait of the rough-and-tumble yet familial world of black show business before and during the civil-rights era."
-The New Yorker

"One can almost taste the fried chicken and poundcake his [Cooke’s] mother makes for summer trips back to Mississippi after the family has relocated to Chicago. And the reader is with Cooke at every step as he follows his dream, from gospel disciple . . . to pop convert."
-Billboard Magazine

"Sam Cooke is one of those singer-songwriters that is oft overlooked in popular parlance, and this is no doubt due to his enigmatic nature and the tragic end he met during his short life. In Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke, eminent rock/blues/soul biographer Peter Guralnick attempts to pierce the fog of myth and rumor that have surrounded Cooke since his untimely demise at the tender age of 33. Guralnick is probably best known for his two-volume Elvis Presley biography (comprising of "Last Train to Memphis" and "Careless Love), but it’s worthwhile to point out that he has been honing his skills in this genre for quite a while, and his maturity shows with Dream Boogie: his half-narrative, half-introspective writing style is well executed and leaves the reader feeling intimate and cozy with his subject matter."
-EdgeBoston.com

"Praise for Peter Guralnick for taking on one of the "titanic" but lesser-known figures of our musical past: "Rock 'n' roll history and, hell, American history, need Peter Guralnick. . . . I can't imagine how exhausting it must be to work on the scale that Guralnick does. . . . Our past needs the love and respect he continues to show it."
-Salon.com

"Guralnick's storytelling skills are up to the task of tracking a figure as charming, lustful, ambitious and ultimately inscrutable as Cooke. . . . A time capsule, an illuminating look at America as it reluctantly embraced soul power."
-Time Out NY

"Engrossing." Guralnick, "he makes all other music historians look like skimmers."
The Boston Herald

"An all-American dream set to sweet soul music."
-The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"From the richness of Guralnick's research, he captures an extraordinary, flawed life that—like Sam's music and the era that produced it—is uplifting and suffused with heartbreak."
-Paste Magazine

"No one has penetrated the lives of [Elvis Presley and Sam Cooke] . . . with such staggering detail and depth of understanding as Guralnick."
-San Francisco Bay Guardian

Easy Reading: The life of Sam Cooke is captured in an excellent biography, Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke, by proficient author Peter Guralnick. The depth of the research in this eloquently written tome is fascinating. The details conveyed in this book draws you into Cooke's life, bringing you into the moment and making you fill as though you're living life with him. Guralnick cleverly captures the extreme dynamics of Cooke's life, everything from his trek on the gospel road, the maneuverings of the record business, and the political and racial commotion that was a critical element to Cooke's fame. This book is a must-read! And why did Guralnick title the book Dream Boogie? "The title is taken from the great Langston Hughes poem at the front of the book, which makes reference to "the boogie-woogie rumble of a dream deferred." "I think the best expression of my sense of Sam Cooke's triumph comes in another poem, by Anne Sexton, about the fall of Icarus, the figure in Greek mythology who dared to dream that he could fly, then fell to his death after coming too close to the sun. 'Admire his wings!' Sexton writes. 'Feel the fire at his neck and see how casually/ he glances up and is caught wondrously tunneling/ into that hot eye. Who cares that he fell back to the sea?/ See him acclaiming the sun and come plunging down/ while his sensible daddy goes straight into town. That, to me, is Sam: the casualness, the grace, the fall-but, above all, the triumph of daring to dream,'" he explained…
-EURweb.com

"As Martin Luther King Jr. left the world with a dream, Cooke left behind a song: 'It's been a long time coming,' he sang, 'but I know a change gonna come.'"
-The San Francisco Chronicle

"Guralnick . . . is that rare critic whose writing is as compelling as the music he raves about."
-Details Magazine.

"No doubt about it, Guralnick's mammoth, meticulously researched bio of the late gospel-cum-pop singer Sam Cooke is an awesome achievement, offering a virtual day-by-day reconstruction of the man's too-short life."
-EW

"The stories [in Peter Guralnick's DREAM BOOGIE] are told with the author's rare gift for biography, and the scenes come to life with incredible clarity. . . . Guralnick's specialty is uncovering the unseen and unheard."
-Contra Costa Times

"Dense, detailed, and utterly captivating."
-Boston Phoenix, David Kirby

"Guralnick writes prose like Cooke wrote songs, with a minimum of outward fuss belying a fanatical attention to detail. Both singer and biographer, in short, make it look easy."
-The Ruminator Review

Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke: For those who only know Sam Cooke through his pop hits – "You Send Me," "Twistin ' the Night Away" and "A Change Is Gonna Come" during the late 1950s and early '60s, this new biography by author Gurainick goes into great depth in detailing the development of the pop/soul icon. Featuring great behind-the-scene interviews that uncover the complicated man who lived behind Cooke's talent and energetic vocal, enables readers to rediscover this remarkable talent.
-http://eurweb.com

"Dream Boogie is an eloquently written and brilliantly researched biography of the legendary Sam Cooke. But it's much more than that. It's a landmark study of the electrical connection between Soul Music and the Civil Rights Movement. A stunning achievement. Peter Guralnick has done it again!"
-Douglas Brinkley, author of The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Ronald Reagan, D-Day, and the U.S. Army 2nd Ranger Battalion and Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War

"Meticulous, thoughtful, driving; Guralnick has done it again, perfectly conveying the essence of American popular culture by immersing us in the irresistible story of this remarkable artist."
-Ken Burns, director of The Civil War and Jazz

"I can't believe how good Dream Boogie is. It goes way beyond music. This is history at its most soulful."
-Ted Widmer, author of Martin Van Buren and Young America

"Peter Guralnick has done for Sam Cooke what he did so magnificently for Elvis Presley-shown us the whole man and the world that made him. This is a great story of a complex man who was more than his adoring public ever dreamed."
-Julian Bond, Chairman of the NAACP

"Dream Boogie eloquently portrays and demystifies the life of Sam Cooke, a giant in the history of American musical expression, who in his brief career managed to stir and rock millions of souls. Rich in detail, deeply insightful, sensitive to the complexity of subject, to both Cooke's triumph and tribulations, Peter Guralnick has written more than a biography of a unique artist who defied categorization. He has illuminated the spiritual and cultural world of gospel and soul in which Cooke thrived and pioneered. Sam Cooke lived his dreams and vision, and Guralnick has made us live them too."
-Leon F. Litwack, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Been in the Storm So Long: The Aftermath of Slavery

"Unsurpassable....The writing is as relaxed, graceful, and affecting as a superior Sam Cooke performance....The author is equally at home with the fine points of the gospel road, the machinations of the record industry, and the sweeping political and racial tumult that was a backdrop to Cooke's meteoric career....To use a gospel-music term...Guralnick turns the house out."
-Kirkus Reviews (Starred review)

"There's no real substitute for the sound of Sam Cooke's music, but the detailed descriptions of his recordings throughout this masterful biography are the next best thing to wearing headphones while you read."
-Publishers Weekly (Starred review)

"Guralnick conducted exhaustive interviews with surviving family and associates and thoroughly mines other sources. . . . An expert biographer. . . . Cooke stands to benefit . . . from such thorough, respectful treatment."
-Booklist (Box review)