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Musicians With Smallest Recording


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Herbie Nichols!

What a huge talent   :rolleyes:

What a small catalogue  :(

Seconded.

I'll add James Spaulding. He's been around the sideman circles, but--considering his talent--he should definitely have more cuts as leader.

Also--Don Ayler (who's practically inivisble apart from his brother's shadow), Jacques Thollot, Luther Thomas... and special recognition for the cats on the LA scene (not just Tapscott--Michael Sessions, Steve Smith, Dwight Trible, Nate Morgan, Phil Ranelin, etc.--just bad)

Edited by ep1str0phy
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Eddie Costa

May come as a surprise, but Costa is in more than a hundred albums (nearing 150). With Costa I think it's a problem of proper exposure (like he had with Farlow's trio) and visibility of his own records (as a leader he recorded for Mode, Jubilee, Dot and half an album for Verve).

I'd go for Fats Navarro. I think everything he recorded fits in four CDs.

F

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Bassist Russell Thorne. Only album I know of that he's on is "The Joe Daley Trio"(RCA), with Daley and Hal Russell, though live performances by that band have been in the process of emerging for some time ("for some time" because, I believe, of sound quality and rights considerations).

Tenor saxophonist Nicky Hill. Tenor saxophonist Fred Schwartz, who never recorded AFAIK. Pianist Christopher Gaddy.

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David -- Metaphysical bookstore in Chicago was the last I heard. The fellow who's trying to put out those Joe Daley Trio tapes, John Corbett, said that he'd spoken to Russell within the last year, and he mentioned my name. I should look him up. BTW, I also have a cassette of Russell playing cello to some electronic tape music he created -- this from the late '70s, I think -- but he and the music were well on their way to metaphysical land. I'll listen again when I get a chance.

Also, two more Chicago-area stalwarts -- pianist Bob Wright and clarinetist Frank Chace. Bob made an excellent cassette of rags and stride pieces in his living room that ragtime guru Terry Waldo put out some years ago, and there are some fabulous live tapes of Bob -- with Chace, trumpeter Nappy Trottier, and drummer Wayne Jones -- that have been floating around for years. Bob BTW was not a Trad player exclusively, if at all -- he came up with Denny Zeitlin and, like early Zeitlin, had made a personal amalgamation of Tristano and Powell, with a strong admixture of Monk in Bob's case. Also, FWIW Bob could play Tristano's "Turkish Mambo" all by himself -- a party piece. He had to stop playing about 10 years ago, though -- arthritis, I believe.

Frank is straight out of Pee Wee Russell, but he invents within that universe with startling power and individuality -- a utterly in-the-moment improviser. His second favorite player is sheets of sound Coltrane, and that's in there too. He's recorded some, only in traditional jazz settings, and I don't know of anything that captures him at his best. I have a tape I made in the late '60s or early '70s of Bob and Frank rehearsing, just the two of them, that's a gem -- standards, Duke's "Warm Valley," Trane's "Lazybird," "If You Could See Me Now," and another Dameron tune.

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...

not to mention

-Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson

...

whose legendary talents were never put on a record!  :(

Well, in fact...

Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson

If you are researching Stride Piano, you will come across many names that are both obscure and legendary in the Stride World. "The Beetle" is one of them. I will do a little more research into the Beetle when I have time but to get things started, the following information comes from Bob Pinsker and was posted to the stride piano email-group in response to queries about the Beetle. Thanks very much to Bob for his contributions!

.....from Bob's email.............

.......as far as Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson is concerned: this fellow was mentioned in several lists of Harlem pianists by the likes of Willie "The Lion", etc., over the years.

Twenty years or so ago, the record producer Paul Affeldt got

intrigued by this phantom name, and started asking his various

friends what they knew about him. Turned out that the pianist Art

Hodes had had a radio show around 1940, and that on one of the shows, had had Henderson as his guest! Fortunately, the show was recorded (transcription disc, I guess). Affeldt had a record label "Euphonic", the last release on which was an LP entitled "Kings of Harlem Stride", which included various rare tracks by James P., Fats Waller, and --- the two tracks of Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson.

  In his liner notes, Affeldt included all of the -- very slim -- biographical information he'd been able to glean on this fellow. Amounts to maybe two paragraphs, almost entirely consisting of a list of references to Henderson by the other stride meisters.

Apparently, Henderson was notably flakey about showing up for gigs. He was scheduled to finally have a recording session, and he never showed up. Turned out that he'd died! An acceptable excuse, for once.    I find the two tracks on this LP, which is supposedly all that exists of Henderson's work that remains, to be quite interesting. He plays two James P. Johnson tunes - "Carolina Shout" and "Keep Off The Grass" - and he plays both in the key of B flat. Johnson had written them in G and F, respectively. Henderson plays with a very nice swing, and a nice touch. It is really very unfortunate that this is all there is.    When Affeldt quit the record business, he sold the Euphonic material to Delmark Records, which is slowly in the process of reissuing the Euphonic LPs on CD. So far, their releases have included the wonderful Charles Thompson CD "The Neglected Professor" and the Brun Campbell CD "Joplin's Disciple". If everyone contacted them and demanded that they release this LP on CD, maybe that would have some influence.

...

[from Mike Lipskin´s Stride Piano website]

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...

not to mention

-Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson

...

whose legendary talents were never put on a record!   :(

Well, in fact...

Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson

If you are researching Stride Piano, you will come across many names that are both obscure and legendary in the Stride World. "The Beetle" is one of them. I will do a little more research into the Beetle when I have time but to get things started, the following information comes from Bob Pinsker and was posted to the stride piano email-group in response to queries about the Beetle. Thanks very much to Bob for his contributions!

.....from Bob's email.............

.......as far as Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson is concerned: this fellow was mentioned in several lists of Harlem pianists by the likes of Willie "The Lion", etc., over the years.

Twenty years or so ago, the record producer Paul Affeldt got

intrigued by this phantom name, and started asking his various

friends what they knew about him. Turned out that the pianist Art

Hodes had had a radio show around 1940, and that on one of the shows, had had Henderson as his guest! Fortunately, the show was recorded (transcription disc, I guess). Affeldt had a record label "Euphonic", the last release on which was an LP entitled "Kings of Harlem Stride", which included various rare tracks by James P., Fats Waller, and --- the two tracks of Stephen "The Beetle" Henderson.

   In his liner notes, Affeldt included all of the -- very slim -- biographical information he'd been able to glean on this fellow. Amounts to maybe two paragraphs, almost entirely consisting of a list of references to Henderson by the other stride meisters.

Apparently, Henderson was notably flakey about showing up for gigs. He was scheduled to finally have a recording session, and he never showed up. Turned out that he'd died! An acceptable excuse, for once.    I find the two tracks on this LP, which is supposedly all that exists of Henderson's work that remains, to be quite interesting. He plays two James P. Johnson tunes - "Carolina Shout" and "Keep Off The Grass" - and he plays both in the key of B flat. Johnson had written them in G and F, respectively. Henderson plays with a very nice swing, and a nice touch. It is really very unfortunate that this is all there is.     When Affeldt quit the record business, he sold the Euphonic material to Delmark Records, which is slowly in the process of reissuing the Euphonic LPs on CD. So far, their releases have included the wonderful Charles Thompson CD "The Neglected Professor" and the Brun Campbell CD "Joplin's Disciple". If everyone contacted them and demanded that they release this LP on CD, maybe that would have some influence.

...

[from Mike Lipskin´s Stride Piano website]

Very interesting! Never heard of him, but hopefully, I will "hear" him!

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