Shrdlu

It seems errors like this always abound in sports commentaries. A classic that used to tick one of my friends off was "not sufficiently good enough", not to mention "this is déjà vu all over again". Here's a great one from a pompous radio broadcaster: "A spokesman said that the matter was being gone into until a solution was found." An Indian soldier had trouble with this British Army regulation: "Beds will be made up as laid down in standing orders." There is a well-known French dish called Bifteck au Jus, beefsteak (served) in juice. In a U.S. restaurant I read "steak with au jus". Yechh!! (And it tasted as bad as you would expect in the circumstances.)

Here's where Shrdlu comes from http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_262a.html I first came across it in an old Australian comic strip called "Colonel Pewter", which used to appear in the Melbourne "Age". When we were grad students, my buddies and I used to say "cwmf!" when annoyed.

That's pretty much my feeling, Bruce. The RVG series has pretty much lost its original aim/style/purpose/whatever, and the exciting days of the early Conns (with terrifying eBay prices) are long gone now. If anyone is paying more than about $7.50 for the RVGs, they are paying too much. There are so many sales that there is no need to pay the official $12.98. Someone from Manitoba posted that a store there sells them for about $7.50 (U.S.), then there's Zweitausendeins.de, then the U.K. HMV site (www.hmv.co.uk) for the Poms.

I grew up on Fats Waller 78s, and I've always loved stride. It was a delight to be able to get virtually ALL of Fats's RCA Victor recordings on CD a few years back. I've always liked it when Monk kicked into stride. He wasn't a bop pianist at all; he was a sort of modern stride player. A huge chunk of his work on his last recording session (the so-called London session) is stride. The recently re-reissued Bud Powell album ("The Scene Changes") has a bit of stride, too! Who can forget Jaki Byard striding, as well. And, in the Bill Evans Verve box set, there's a spoof version of "Dark Eyes" on which Bill strides and Elvin does a Gene Krupa.

Yeah, this is all very interesting! I was going to ask you to re-post the Jimmy Smith settings, Jim; you put them on the old BN board, but ... An obvious question is: can you still get parts for the B3, or do you have to get custom-made parts? I suppose, as with a vintage car, you could get another purely for parts.

Only recently did I get to hear Fats Waller's twenties recordings on the pipe organ at RCA Victor's Camden, NJ studio. (As you may know, they acquired a disused church auditorium that had a pipe organ - obviously you could not have a pipe organ in a regular studio. Camden is right next to Philly, and it would have been a bit of a pain to have the New York guys travel all the way there for a session, I guess.) Fats sounds fantastic on the big monster. There is one session with the organ and two horns, on which Fats gets a sound like a big orchestra. Apparently, there is a delay between the player hitting a key and the note coming out, so it is hard to make pipe organs swing, but Fats was totally in command of it, and swings like crazy. After those few recordings, Fats did not record on the pipe organ again very much. There was one thirties session with the "Rhythm" at Camden, but only two selections used the organ, one being the classic "Night Wind". If only there were more.

'Cos Ron McMaster did the transfers!

The recent RVG of this is now to hand (and, to ear!), and I must say that I'm very pleased with the sound. This music is an old friend, and it was good to have an excuse to play it again. In the living room, on the speakers, it sounded so clear that I almost felt that Bud, Paul and Art were right there with me, or that I was in a chair in Rudy's living room during the session. I could even picture Rudy, Al and Frank sitting opposite me, Rudy perched behind his tape decks and Al with his owl-like glasses looking across the room. Oh, Frank's flash just blinded me temporarily! There is still absolutely no tape hiss or dropout, and the music is so realistic. I can almost see Art's drum skins during the solos. Someone once said that Rudy remasters Powell sessions extra well. I'm not sure about that, but he certainly did a fine job with all the Powell reissues. As for the music on this album, it tends to have the same kind of feel throughout, but that is not a fault, as it's all so good. Just about all BN albums are excellent, but here we have one of the few real giants of the music that they ever recorded. Bud is just on a different plane than nearly every other BN artist. This is something very special. Paul Chambers gets drawn in by the special nature of this occasion, and plays at his most exciting. There are several moments on this album that just grip me, and really hold my attention. Definitely one to get!

"Hub Tones", with the silly outer cover, which I still dare not discard.

You may be right, but they did say that the U.S. RVGs are not limited editions. And Fantasy has never deleted any Original Jazz Classics. I would imagine that most of us BN fans have pretty well all of the RVGs that we want, especially if you're talking the earlier ones, now that we can pick them up for about $7.50 in various sales. The way the RVG program is going, it may kind of diffuse itself into oblivion. There are now so many that it is hard to keep up the original concept/aim/purpose. They might as well just call them Blue Note CDs anymore.

That pious liner statement is total rubbish, as the artists don't get anything from these reissues of old recordings. My evidence? Someone recently got McCoy Tyner to autograph their copy of the RVG of "The Real McCoy". The guy said to McCoy that it's a very popular album. "I wish I got some royalties from it", groaned McCoy. And what of reissues of Hank Mobley albums? I don't think Hank had a family of his own, so who would get the royalties if any were paid out? Now, the artists may get royalties from new releases (that is, recent sessions being put out for the first time). And I'm sure that "In Sink" and the other pop stars get royalties.

You wouldn't be sorry if you got the Byrd/Adams set, Bev. Although everyone's good on that set, Pepper pretty well steals the show. That set has a lot of variety, a lot of excellent sidemen, very good production (of the original sessions, that is), a fine selection of tunes and lots of good solos. You can't go wrong. Even Ron McMaster plays well on it. My favorite of the sessions is the one with Duke Pearson. It gels very well, with Philly Joe in fine form. There is also a stunning perormance of "I Will Wait For You" (on the late session with Chick Corea) which is worthy of Miles at his best. Just about the best Byrd I have ever heard, and it would be hard to find outside the Mosaic set.

I think you guys have just saved me $16, or whatever this CD costs.

I got my earthquake insurance in October, 1983, praise God. It's just about my 20th anniversary. (I don't remember the exact day, but that's not necessary.)

Songs like "To God Be The Glory", "The Haven Of Rest", "I Know Whom I Have Believed", and so on.

Tell ya what: Mr Sumner sure is a fine musician. Gil Evans backed him with his band in the 80s - I have a video clip of one tune from a concert that they did together. That would make a nice CD.

Bev, I wouldn't bother with the Chambers/Kelly Mosaic. I love both of these guys, but they are on plenty of other sessions (as you know), and I found a lot of this Mosaic kinda boring. I don't usually mind alternates, but the Mosaic overdoes it, and I find my attention wandering as the umpteenth take of "Scotch And Soda" plays. I also don't like the Strozier session, as he can't play in tune - a requirement for a musician, surely. The Kelly sessions would be better if there were a horn or two present. I would recommend the other Vee Jay Mosaic, the Morgan/Shorter collection. That's very exciting and interesting (some very nice Clifford Jordan, by the way) and Kelly and Chambers are on a lot of it anyway. Paul's BN sessions are excellent, so I'm glad that you got the Select - dependent on how the remastering sounds. (I have other versions of all of that collection, so I won't be ordering the new box.)

... and there was I, enjoying the schnapps version without even knowing that there was an issue ...

The way it's going, they'll soon have an RVG of everything from 1501 through about 4300!

I posted this ahwile back, but about 6 months ago, a hacker got into my eBay account and the email address which I was using for eBay. As they changed the email password, I lost that email address. I'm glad that I did not use that email address for anything but eBay. But I am enjoying the 200 soup bowls that the hacker bought using my eBay ID.

I've seen MANY photos that are mirror images, that is, the wrong way around. The Impulse digipacks do this a lot. As a sax player, I don't appreciate seeing people like Trane playing the top end of the tenor with their right hand. (George Braith, yes, but not regular sax players.)

Isn't that awful, Undergroundagent? Just when you wonder if stores and service could possibly get any worse, something like this happens. Definitely cut loose from that store. Most things that I could say have already been well said. Also, I was surprized the see the cost of the glasses. Perhaps it's a complex prescription. Is this the going price these days in Canada? Another thought: you need these quickly. What about those "next day", or 4 hours places?

It is amazing that a man who is as busy as Michael Cuscuna finds time to reply to our emails - I've had several replies, too. Not only that, but in 1997, I wrote to Blue Note at a California address that I saw on one of their CDs, and the reply came from Michael in New York (or Connecticut). Mike, when I first read your thread, I thought that you meant an empty Mosaic box! I have purchased a few of these, as you can store four 4 CD jewel cases in them in a compact space.

David Newman is the cousin of Anthony Williams and Bob Crenshaw.

I expect Hiroshi Tanno can keep you supplied for a while. Nice one, David Bach!