AllenLowe

interesting Whiteman endorsement - Anthony Braxton sang the praises of this band to me when I talked to him last summer - also, Ferde Grofe did his best work with that band, I think (better than his semi-classical pieces, at least to me)

I've done a lot of this kind of work, but actually haven't heard the Sunbeam - the key in all of this is 1) original sources -how clean? Masters? Stampers? Metal parts? 78's? Old vinyl 78's? 2) quality of transfer - turntable - styli? 3) conversion - from analog to digital - VERY important - good quality converters? 16 bit, 20 bit, 24 bit? Dithering (the process that puts them back down to 16 bits) or noise shaping (another of these processes)? 4) keeping them in the digital domain once transferred (going back to analog and than to digital again can be very destructive) 5) technique of de-clicking and de-crackling - there are software programs, but none that I have heard work as well as CEDAR, except, maybe, for some spot restoration (a stray pop or click) - 6) NEVER USE DE-HISS - it sucks; and I will make an exception with myself because I know how to use it AND i have incredibly good MONITORS - de-hiss CAN be used but I never recommend it because it is usually botched - the usual programs are auto-de-hiss and one has to over-ride this in order to do it well - I have incredibly good sounding Bix LPs from British EMI, I think it is, and even better transfers on a Franklin Mint, I think it is,LP set (I was thrilled to be able to hear Venuti say, clearly, "Barnacle Bill the Shithead.") ; the original work on these AND the American Columbias is excellent - they may not sound as good initially if you play them on a turntable because the original mastering engineers did some roll off of high end, because that was basically the only noise reduction technique they had to use - so if you put 'em to digital and use good digital equalization along with a good noise reduction module (like CEDAR) you can make them sound nearly as good as anything contemporary that I have heard - problem is that it is work and few people have these tools. also, did John Rt Davies do the Sunbeams? John was known to have "secret" access to the EMI archives at times; also, he had thousands of MINT shape 78s. and Doug Pomeroy, by the way, is a great guy and master at all of this -

about 15 years ago I played for for William Styron's 65th (I think it was) birthday party in Connecticut and in walked Mia Farrow; this was not long after her whole thing with Woody Allen, the custody trial, the sex scandal, etc. So Harold Danko, who's playing piano, looks at me and says "what should we play?" I told him and the band "Woody 'n You." nobody else thought it was a good idea -

well, there's the line from Bill Crow's book about one of Lester Young's sideman, whose playing was bugging Prez, saying to him during a break, "hey Prez, when was the last time we played together?" Lester Young answered: "tonight."

Aerosmith - god help us -

I actually hate Led Zep, for many musical reasons, but I'll tell you the chief one - I've always thought of Plant as the guy who gave us the essential bad-white-guy-trying-to-sing-like-a-white-guy-who-sounds-black model of rockand roll lead singer -others tried before him, but he did it with a vengeance, and it's because of him that we have groups like those bozos from Massachusetts - sorry, very tired today and can't think of the name of the group, the lead singer is the guy whose daughter is an actress -

that does look an awful lot like Kart - look, if people get tired of this thread, we can always go back to Scott Yanow -

sorry, Clifford, lost continuity there - I really find OP like that trumpeter, what's his name, the guy from Cuba who always sounds like he's playing Fllight of the Bumble-bee? Sandoval - but to me the ultimate indictment of Peterson is something I referred to earlier in that other thread; that I, Allen Lowe, pedestrian pianist and former chopper of chopsticks and other etudes from the John something-or-other first piano book, can do a passable imitation of Oscar playing the blues on piano - lots of little blues cliches executed with speed and no finesse, up and down the keys, up and down and round and round - impresses people who know little about jazz. It's also a little bit, to me, like that Groucho line about not wanting to be a member of any club that would have him as a member - I don't want to listen to any piano player who plays like me -

of course, Larry's no Jim Alfredson, who plays that big thing with all the keys and the pedals, I think it may be just a huge accordion but I'm not sure - will have to ask CHEWY -

on the other hand, Larry plays a mean Lady of Spain on accordion -

and while we're on the subject, I never liked Larry Kart's piano playing, either - sorry, Larry, but when it comes to piano you're no Bill Evans (actually referring to Yusef Lateef, or is it that guy who used to play tenor with Miles? Or maybe I mean Gil Evans, not the arranger, but the guy who used to play at the Holiday Inn in Cleveland) -

"As I stated in the RIP thread, I am firmly in the Peterson camp" there's always one nasty guy who has to mess up the thread -

but all seriousness aside, I think we have been respectful but dissident - nothing wrong with that, I think - there's an old phrase that has been used when examining the life of someone, "without tears," meaning giving that life a serious evaluation without obscuring sentiment - I would certainly hope that if I go under, everyone here will join in and recount what a saint I was - even those who have no idea who the hell I am -

I got one, said, "if you don't call me within the half hour I'll jump off a bridge." dated November 15 -

I was in Times Square and a hooker came up to me and said, "for 200 bucks I'll do anything you want." I said, "paint my house."

the other morning my kids started screaming, "the house is on fire." My wife said, "quiet, you'll wake up daddy."

going back to Shecky Greene - Buddy Hackett said Greene once got drunk and drove his car into the fountain at one of the Vegas Hotels - when they came to fish him out, he looked at his rescuers and said "no hot wax."

don't shake Jake -

Sheik of Araby (I got a lot of people pissed off on the Jazz Research list a few years ago by pointing out that this is a song about rape, so I won't even mention that here) -

just to add, yes, to each his/her own - we who dislike O.P.'s playing are not advocating repression of his recordings (though I have thought about it) - we are just voicing our opinions - and do not wish to interfere with your listening pleasure - however, there will be a CD burning of all of Kenny G's recordings tonight at midnight - please be on time -

1) thank you for placing me among the jazz elite. No one has ever done this before. I certainly hope there's an honorarium or annuity attached to such an honor - 2) as for Turrentine, as a jazz player he was much superior to O.P. - though he recorded a lot of commercial stuff, when he blew he was a fine jazz man; see his stuff with Max Roach, among other things - 3) I once took an informal poll of jazz pianists that I knew about their feelings about O.P. (poll was conducted circa 1980) - it's a small sampling, but interesting: a) Bob Neloms - "I like him." b) Barry Harris: "He's not my favorite." c) Bill Triglia: "I admire his technique but he's not a jazz pianist." d) Bill Evans: "He's one of my favorites." e) Duke Jordan: "Great pianist." f) Jaki Byard: "Cliches." g) Joe Albany: "I used to hear him in California." interesting assortment of pianists and opinions, I thought -

what do I have against acoustic guitars? well, it's kind of a horrible story but my aunt was in Wal Mart years ago and one of those Esteban guitars fell off the wall and hit her on the head and she was paralyzed for life - now she can only communicate by blinking her left eye, and since she has cataracts we don''t know what the hell she's saying - the other day she blinked at me and I had to give her a swirly -

"her liver would fail" which inspired that famous song, "Fry Me Some Liver" -

it's a little like the old Mad Magazine feature about letters found in the "dead letter file" at the post office - they were always desperate things like - "if you don't call me immediately I will jump off a bridge" - and dated about 10 years before -

yes - that's what caught my attention - "He donated it to the University of Idaho's International Jazz Collection following his death at age 80 in 1994." that's a good trick -