Michael Fitzgerald

I certainly would recognize Mr. Ties, who I've known online since 1991 or so when he was running the Sun Ra mailing list and campaigning to get discounts for us on Evidence CDs - never did pan out, but the effort was appreciated.... Mike

The organissimo fund drive for May?? I am not serious. Mike

I do have more respect for the words of someone who is not being anonymous - and I think there is a difference between "not being anonymous" and "using one's real name" - but on the other hand I know the real names of four of the worst bottom-dwellers on the jazz bulletin board circuit and that does absolutely nothing in terms of improving the crap they have spewed. Honestly, unless I know someone's real name, his identity is forgettable to me. For whatever that's worth. I am infinitely more likely to remember a real name than a "handle". Sorry, but that's how it is for me. Mike

BTW, Brian Priestley is working on a Bird book. I have his "little" Bird book (part of the Kings of Jazz series) - which is still quite good as a primer. Judging by his Mingus book, I have a feeling his upcoming one on Parker will be outstanding. Mike

Woideck. But apparently one should get the paperback rather than the hardcover as some corrections were made. Mike

Start with the Pettinger - the other one isn't nearly as meaty. Mike

Not actually true. 30 seconds with the Stockholm show revealed Coltrane to be unquestionably present on the in heads of So What and Walkin' - he may be there very low on All Blues too. Pretty sure things like On Green Dolphin Street and Fran Dance were always Miles alone, so nothing to read into Coltrane's absence on those. Mike

Not one but TWO recent articles (plus some letters) in the New York Times on this very subject: =============================== When Seth Shepsle goes to Starbucks, he orders a ''medium'' because ''grande'' -- as the coffee company calls the size, the one between big and small -- annoys him. Meg Daniel presses zero whenever she hears a computerized operator on the telephone so that she can talk to a real person. ''Just because they want a computer to handle me doesn't mean I have to play along,'' she said. When subscription cards fall from magazines Andrew Kirk is reading, he stacks them in a pile at the corner of his desk. At the end of each month, he puts them in the mail but leaves them blank so that the advertiser is forced to pay the business reply postage without gaining a new subscriber. Life can involve big hardships, like being fired or smashing up your car. There is only so much you can do about them. But far more prevalent -- and perhaps in the long run just as insidious -- are life's many little annoyances. These, you can do something about. To examine the little weapons people use for everyday survival is to be given a free guidebook on getting by, created by the millions who feel that they must. It is a case study in human inventiveness, with occasional juvenile and petty passages, and the originators of these tips are happy to share them. ''They're an integral part of how people cope,'' said Prof. James C. Scott, who teaches anthropology and political science at Yale University, and the author of ''Weapons of the Weak,'' about the feigned ignorance, foot-dragging and other techniques Malaysian peasants used to avoid cooperating with the arrival of new technology in the 1970's. ''All societies have them, but they're successful only to the extent that they avoid open confrontation.'' The slow driver in fast traffic, the shopper with 50 coupons at the front of the checkout line and the telemarketer calling at dinner all inflict life's thousand little lashes. But some see these infractions as precious opportunities, rare chances for retribution in the face of forces beyond our control. Wesley A. Williams spent more than a year exacting his revenge against junk mailers. When signing up for a no-junk-mail list failed to stem the flow, he resorted to writing at the top of each unwanted item: ''Not at this address. Return to sender.'' But the mail kept coming because the envelopes had ''or current resident'' on them, obligating mail carriers to deliver it, he said. Next, he began stuffing the mail back into the ''business reply'' envelope and sending it back so that the mailer would have to pay the postage. ''That wasn't exacting a heavy enough cost from them for bothering me,'' said Mr. Williams, 35, a middle school science teacher who lives in Melrose, N.Y., near Albany. After checking with a postal clerk about the legality of stepping up his efforts, he began cutting up magazines, heavy bond paper, and small strips of sheet metal and stuffing them into the business reply envelopes that came with the junk packages. ''You wouldn't believe how heavy I got some of these envelopes to weigh,'' said Mr. Williams, who added that he saw an immediate drop in the amount of arriving junk mail. A spokesman for the United States Postal Service, Gerald McKiernan, said that Mr. Williams's actions sounded legal, as long as the envelope was properly sealed. Sometimes, small acts of rebellion offer big doses of relief. ''I've come to realize that I'm almost addicted to the sick little pleasure I get from lashing out at these things,'' said Mr. Kirk, 24, a freelance writer from Brooklyn who collects and returns magazine inserts. When ordering a pizza from Domino's, Mr. Kirk says he always requests a ''small,'' knowing that he will be corrected and told that medium is the smallest available size. ''It makes me feel better to point out that their word games aren't fooling anyone,'' he said. The Internet offers a booming trade to help with this type of annoyance-fighting behavior. For example, shared passwords to free Web sites are available at www.bugmenot.com to help people avoid dealing with long registration forms. To coexist with loud cellphone talkers, the Web offers hand-held jammers that, although illegal in the United States, can block all signals within a 45-foot radius. Mitch Altman, a 48-year old inventor living in San Francisco, said that in the last three months he has sold about 30,000 of his key-chain-size zappers called TV-B-Gone, which can be used discreetly to switch off televisions in public places. ''When you go to a restaurant to talk with friends, why should you have to deal with the distraction of a ceiling-mounted television?'' Mr. Altman said. Some Web sites specialize in arming people against online annoyances. The site www.slashdot.org posted the name and the mailing address of one of the worst known spammers, encouraging people to sign the spammer up for catalogs and other junk mail to be sent to the spammer's home. Mr. McKiernan of the Postal Service said that this tactic also appeared to be legal, but might constitute harassment. Some groups are more frustrated than others. In 2002, Harris Interactive, a market research group based in Rochester, conducted a phone survey called the Daily Hassle Scale that asked 1,010 people to rank the aggravations they faced in a typical day. The survey found that poor people and African-Americans suffer the most stress from the everyday annoyances such as noisy neighbors, telemarketers and pressure at work, but it did not explain why. Sometimes, the resistance to these frustrations is organized. Work slowdowns are methods commonly used by labor unions to apply pressure without actually striking. During the Solidarity movement in Poland, people expressed their disapproval of the government-run news media by taking a walk with their hats on backward at exactly 6 p.m. when the state news program started. When the government noticed the trend, it issued curfews, but people then put their televisions in their windows facing outward so that only the police walking the streets would see the broadcasts. ''You have to remember, in Poland during those years showing up drunk at work was seen as a patriotic act because people hated the bosses so much,'' Professor Scott said. But even on less coordinated levels, shared frustration is often the augur of countercultural trends. Mr. Shepsle said he took great solace in discovering his irritations with Starbucks' lingo summed up on a popular T-shirt in Chicago. The shirt, which mocks the pretentiousness of a certain Chicago neighborhood, features two names. Next to Lincoln Park it says ''Tall, Grande, Venti.'' Next to Wicker Park it says ''Small, Medium, Large.'' ''It's nice to know I'm not alone,'' said Mr. Shepsle, 28, who works for a theater company in Manhattan. Most people participate in this sort of behavior on some level, Professor Scott said, adding that his own habit was to write ''England'' rather than ''United Kingdom'' on letters he sends to his British friends. He described this as his way of disregarding British claims to Wales and Scotland. ''As a tactic, it doesn't amount to much except a way to provide a tiny and private sense of satisfaction,'' he said. ''But that's something.'' [Photograph] Wesley A. Williams, a teacher in Melrose, N.Y., weighs down junk mail that he returns to sender. He hopes it will cost mailers in postage due. (Photo by Stewart Cairns for The New York Times); Seth Shepsle, who works for a theater company in Manhattan, finds the lingo used to sell coffee at Starbucks tremendously irritating. He prefers a ''medium'' to the company's ''grande,'' and he always orders it that way. (Photo by Angel Franco/The New York Times); Why must small, medium and large be tall, grande and venti? (Photo by Angel Franco/The New York Times)(pg. B5); (pg. A1) ================================== To the Editor: Re ''No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances'' (front page, March 15): It was interesting to learn some of the strategies people use to make their own personal statement against these annoyances. In our family, when we receive a call from a telemarketer, it becomes another opportunity for creative role playing. I've happily announced in my deepest voice, ''This is she,'' when someone from a credit card company asks for my wife. My daughter enjoys the persona of an overly enthusiastic and talkative teenager. Different accents are also fun to explore; we have been anything from a suspicious shut-in to a big-hearted Texas cattle rancher, whatever strikes us at the moment. Although this is clearly at the expense of the hapless employees, we feel that it may even liven up their day as they methodically run through their call list. Blake Rowe Ossining, N.Y., March 15, 2005 To the Editor: I find it humorous that most of the people quoted in ''No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances'' seem to actually have no life. If they did, they'd not be wasting it on such trivial and inane matters as what Starbucks calls its sizes. If it is really that annoying, shop somewhere else and stop being annoyed. What a concept! I suspect that some people like being annoyed; otherwise they wouldn't have anything to complain about, and that is what truly makes them happy. Matt Mizenko San Francisco, March 15, 2005 To the Editor: I was puzzled when I learned in ''No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances'' that a freelance writer is annoyed by subscription cards falling out of magazines. I've got news for him: They are the world's best bookmarks. Jim Weis Atlanta, March 15, 2005 To the Editor: The March 18 letters commenting on ''No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances'' (front page, March 15) brought me back to my year as a telemarketer. It seemed that everyone, when he or she discovered my occupation, had a smug announcement of an oh-so-clever way of dispatching people like me. Sorry, folks, but we've heard them all before. Yes, we know you pretend to be your wife. Yes, we've heard the one about how much are we willing to pay for your time. Yes, we do always call at dinner (when else are you at home?). No, you're not entertaining us, and you're much less original than you think. Hang up or put yourself on the Do Not Call registry. Stop wasting our time and yours. Josh Nugent Amherst, Mass., March 18, 2005 =============================== As it turns out, frustration -- not necessity -- may be the true mother of invention. An article that appeared in The New York Times last week about the things people do to deal with life's many little annoyances spurred a flood of responses from readers offering their own tactics. While providing a telling look at the banal things that bother people, these reactions also shed light on the lengths people go to extract retribution for mundane infractions. But most of all, they revealed the creativity in passive aggression. Dena Roslan was sick of a co-worker who kept helping himself to her lunch cookies. So Ms. Roslan, 30, a clothing designer who works in Manhattan, bought a bag of dog biscuits that looked like biscotti. ''My only remorse was not being able to see his face after he ate the bait,'' she said. Stewart Dean said he despised the scripted questions people ask at the end of service phone calls. ''It's especially galling when they ask, 'Is there anything else we can do to make you completely satisfied?' and they haven't even solved the problem you called about,'' said Mr. Dean, 57, a computer administrator for Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y. So he said he routinely makes requests that the person on the phone cannot possibly fulfill. ''I usually respond: 'Sure. Would you please get Bush out of the White House?''' To be annoyed is to be human, and while many people cope with small frustrations by ignoring them, odd things do get to people. ''It just doesn't make any sense,'' said Janine Papp, 30, a grant writer who works for a nonprofit group in Manhattan. She is annoyed that the smallest popcorn size at her nearby theater is called ''child-size.'' ''I'm an adult, so why should I have to ask for a child's item?'' Ms. Papp said. ''If I order a 'small,' I'll be getting a medium-size bag, so I just ask for the 'smallest possible bag' of popcorn.'' Every time he eats at a fast-food restaurant, Mitchell Jacobs is reminded of how much he dislikes the expectation that he will bus his own table. ''Doesn't McDonald's make enough money? Come on, Ronald, hire some people to clean the tables,'' said Mr. Jacobs, 70, a retired businessman from Manhattan, adding that he now just leaves his trash at the table. For many, the simple goal is to give adversaries a taste their own medicine. Tony Manzo takes his stand at the local video store. ''I always say, 'Hello, how are you today, sir?' in the most monotone voice I can muster,'' said Mr. Manzo, 29, a writer from San Francisco. ''The point is to pre-empt the bored and slovenly teenager behind the counter before he mumbles the words to me. It's a way to show him just how annoying his soggy monotone refrain is for us to hear on the other side of the counter.'' When subscription cards fall out of Chris Marzuk's magazines, he fills them in with the addresses of the senders. ''That way Time magazine can pay the return postage and also get plenty of subscriptions to Time magazine,'' wrote Mr. Marzuk, 54, a school administrator from Greenlawn, N.Y. Telemarketers may provoke the angriest reactions. Some people put them on hold and never return to the phone. Others say they put their toddlers on the phone, encouraging them to babble until the caller succumbs. But the most common tactic is avoidance. Although Carol Lydon, 38, of Philadelphia has a day job as a paralegal, she tells telemarketers who call at night that she is running out to work. ''I'm also never over 18 when they ask to speak with someone over the age of 18, and I'm always the housekeeper if they ask if I'm authorized to make decisions regarding phone service, cable television service,'' she added. Others take their small acts of rebellion a step further. Dawn Quiett said she had changed her voting habits in reaction to unsolicited calls from campaigners. Ms. Quiett, a 35-year-old publicist from Dallas, said that during the last presidential race she received so many calls from pollsters and party officials that she began telling them she would not vote for any candidate who used telemarketers. Of course, some people go overboard. Having worked in the past for several small direct-mail marketers, Donna Rothkopf of Astoria, Queens, said that envelopes often came back with everything from used condoms to giant cockroaches in them. ''The truly hostile respondent used more sinister weapons of retribution, like the top of an aluminum can, a razor blade, or a handful of broken glass,'' she said. ''These are Pyrrhic victories that fail to influence the way of doing business, but succeed in bringing harm to an innocent cog.'' [Photograph] Dena Roslan, sick of a co-worker who helped himself to her lunch cookies, retaliated by baiting him with biscotti-style dog biscuits. (Photo by Marko Georgiev for The New York Times) ========================= Mike

Lead guitarist sequence is correct, but Clapton was a replacement himself, for original member Top Topham. Yardbirds issue listing here: http://www.angelfire.com/rock3/yardbird_se...iscography.html EMI history info here: http://www.ketupa.net/emi2.htm Columbia (EMI) issue listing here: http://www.chartwatch.co.uk/TopTen/labels/lab142.htm Mike

I tried that already before I posted - you can get to certain things, but I can't seem to make the site work as designed. Seems to have something to do with the frames setup. Mike

Isn't it more accurate to say they recorded for Columbia? I suspect the problem is the relationship of EMI to Columbia (which differed in the US and UK, right?) and then the involvement of their manager Giorgio Gomelsky? The recording with Sonny Boy Williamson was originally on Fontana in UK and Mercury in US, I think. All the material in the set is from the Gomelsky period. The post-Gomelsky stuff is held by EMI, and was issued on EMI CDs. Mike

Any variation in flugelhorn appearance is due to the wrap design. They are all the same length uncoiled. The only significant difference would be 3-valve vs. 4-valve. There used to be a great site called www.flugelhorns.com that had hundreds of pictures and descriptions. Alas, no longer. Mike

Yep

Gotta disagree with the recommendation of Secret Story as being somehow representative of the Pat Metheny Group - it's not a Group album at all. (I also think it's not a good album at all, but I won't get into that.) I also find Offramp to be an odd selection for starting out - my pick for a PMG startoff would be Travels, the live album (from the Offramp tour) which includes the early stuff (Phase Dance, San Lorenzo), the later stuff (Are You Going With Me), an abridged As Falls Wichita, plus a bunch of wonderful new pieces that weren't ever recorded elsewhere. Plus it has the lineup with Danny Gottlieb and Nana Vasconcelos. It brings in the Brazilian elements that were a big part of the next decade or so, but I think it does them better and with less "slickification". I'm going to see the band next weekend. Have only heard parts of the new record. I'll have to pick it up before the show. Or maybe I won't. I remember the excitement of hearing the band in 1989 on the "pre-record" tour when they played most of the Letter From Home album before it was recorded. All those tunes didn't even have titles at that point. It was quite a different experience hearing that stuff fresh without any references. Mike

Only on one track. Mike

No, the GRP recording used transcriptions. The original parts had not been discovered at that point. Ditto for the Miles at Montreux performance. Mike

Jazz 'Round The World - an interesting album with interpretations of folk tunes from various places. Mike

Remember, in the 1960s Cherry recorded on "regular" cornet too - with Rollins and on his Blue Note albums, at least. The flumpet is a hybrid between flugelhorn and trumpet made only by Dave Monette. I've never played one (I'll never afford a Monette - $6500 for a used flumpet) and can't say how exactly it differs from a cornet, but from the description, it seems to lean more towards the flugelhorn. Mike

More than you wanted to know: http://www.dallasmusic.org/gearhead/Pocket%20trumpets.html Regarding sound differences - who have you ever heard play both? I suspect the difference is due to the player not the instrument. Mike

Curson is shown with not a pocket trumpet (which is the same length as a trumpet, cornet, or flugelhorn but coiled very differently) but rather a piccolo trumpet. The piccolo trumpet (there are several different keys) is MUCH shorter in length than the standard issue trumpet. The fourth valve adds tubing, allowing for lower notes and for better intonation in certain situations. I can't think of what Hubbard ever played that had four valves - flugelhorn would be my only thought, though I've always seen him with the much more common three-valve model. Long shot would be a rotary valve flugelhorn like the ones that Jimmy Owens, Wilbur Harden, and Claudio Roditi have played. These make it look like the player is holding the instrument sideways when playing. Other four valves instances: flugelhorn, euphonium, baritone horn, tuba (sometimes 5 even) - and the exceedingly rare quarter-tone trumpets that Don Ellis used. The fourth valve on the double (french) horn is quite different, effectively switching between two different instruments, typically the F horn and the higher B-flat horn. No, the short, long, BIG thing doesn't help because it isn't always true. I could show you trumpets that look like cornets, flugelhorns that look like cornets, and cornets that look like trumpets. Mike

All B-flat cornets are the same length when uncoiled. Any variation in how they are coiled will result in *appearing* shorter - but they aren't really. I believe what is referred to above is the "shepherd's crook" variation. Again, range is exactly the same. Let's not get into E-flat cornets, etc. Instruments in different keys ARE different lengths. Mike

Not essential, in my view. I've seen this as 1964 or "late 1960s" - but the issues give NO date whatsoever. Anyone got anything better in terms of a date for this? If indeed it is "late 1960s" then it might be late for Timmons, but everyone else had at least a decade more to go. Mike

There's been quite a bit written about this and fortunately, I think the major figures did speak on the subject at one time or another. It would be just a matter of compiling this existing stuff into a "Birth Of The Cool Reader". The right person for this would be Jeff Sultanof. He knows more about the stuff than anyone I know of. I believe he's putting an article together for the Annual Review of Jazz Studies, but it's primarily on what he did to publish the scores - but it will be a must-read, and I'm sure there will be some background history of the group and the tunes. Mike

There is no such thing as a Johnny Richards small group, is there? Mike

Absolutely there is a book of all the scores - it's one of the masterpieces that every musician should have. Jeff Sultanof prepared it using the original parts (long thought to be lost). It even includes stuff that was in the band's repertoire but was never recorded. http://www.halleonard.com/item_detail.jsp?...nd=E&catcode=06 Mike