Andrew Bisset

Andrew Bisset (20 January 195314 April 2005) was an Australian author, music educator and singer, based in Canberra.

Author

Andrew Bisset wrote Black Roots White Flowers – A History of Jazz in Australia (11 November 1979), which traces Australian jazz influences and performances from 1918 and the early days of visiting African American vaudeville shows and jazz teas at the Tivoli, through to the year of its publication. According to The Canberra Times Michael Foster it is "the first serious study of jazz in Australia." As a follow-up, Bisset presented a ten-part series on ABC Radio National in 1987, History of Australian Jazz up to World War Two.

Bob Dixon, also from The Canberra Times, reviewed the re-publication of Bisset's book in 1987; he described how "early chapters deal with the 1910s and 1920s and are mostly a dullish catalogue of dance bands, which could only by a real stretch of the imagination be said to play jazz. It is interesting to read, though, that several Negro bands were refused permission to visit Australia in the 1920s, because of our racial policy." Bisset, Andrew: Black Roots White Flowers – A History of Jazz in Australia. Foreword by Don Burrows. Sydney and Auckland, Golden Press 1979. Sharpe, John: A Cool Capital: The Canberra Jazz Scene 1925-2005. Foreword by Mike Price. Canberra Publishing and Printing 2006.