BillF

We've been "Blaired" - or is it "Browned"? Either way it comes out as a turd.

"Too Little, Too Soon: Booker Little" on Night Lights from WFIU.

The Great Big Bands, Vol 2: Woody Herman and His Orchestra (Capitol) Tracks from the Second and Third Herds.

Naturally, I've been checking out the Urso in my record collection and, apart from the Chet Baker albums already mentioned, I've found a Capitol LP with a couple of tracks from Phil's stint with Herman in 1950. ""Music to Dance To" (Cohn)and "Sonny Speaks" (Berman) were recorded in Nashville on June 25th 1950 with Bob Graf, Phil and Buddy Wise on tenors. The tenor solos on each track are credited to Graf.

Yes, interesting! I first noticed Bob Zieff's name among composer credits on some of my Chet Baker albums and later found lots of references to him when I read James Gavin's Deep in a Dream: the Long Night of Chet Baker.

Crescent is one of the Impulses i'm still missing. it's high on my wish list, followed by Coltrane. i'm waiting for these to be reissued as Impulse Originals. i debated long enough wether i should get the 90s 20-bit releases (after all that is one of my favourite reissue series ever, together with the 5000 series Conns and the West Coast Classics) but i think sound might be a bit superior on the new ones. packaging is a different question, of course. there are little reissue series (excepting mini LPs, maybe) that come close to the elegance and beauty of that one. but for a change, and because they are midpriced, i'll wait for the new ones. or shouldn't i? one of the lesser known Coltranes i really love (it could be one of my favourite pre-Impulse albums) is Coltrane plays the blues on Atlantic. it's just a blues program, but what playing! And Africa|Brass is also a favourite. Yes, Coltrane Plays the Blues is a fine one, which sadly I don't own.

Bebop Spoken Here on KBCS. Now playing: "Soft Winds" from Jazz Messengers at Cafe Bohemia, Vol 1 (Blue Note)

A good start! My favorite Hubbard album!

One thing that stuck in my mind about Urso is that Richard Cook and Brian Morton use the term "mentholated" to describe his ultra-cool tenor on Chet Baker's At the Forum Theater and Cools Out. That's an adjective I haven't met elsewhere in jazz criticism!

Some very early morning radio listening for me and managed to catch Bright Moments for the first time, Bill.

It's a wonderful track from a wonderful album! Things are going well in that college!

By "too flat" do you mean "too dull, or boring", or are you talking about problems of pitch? If the latter, I have no complaint about Jackie, but always find Gigi Gryce too sharp. Any views on this? I mean flat, as far as pitch is concerned. And I don't like his tone that much. I listened to the CD this afternoon, and I can hear that he plays very well, and I appreciate it, but I just don't like his sound. I hear that Gigi Gryce is sharp, sometimes, but since I like his tone and phrasing, I don't mind. It's a personal thing: You like a player's sound and conception, or you don't. As Ornette famously said, "You can play flat in tune and you can play sharp in tune." IMO Jackie usually plays flat in tune, especially on Blue Note; in his Prestige days a bit less so (i.e. less in tune and more just flat), though his sound still moves me. Some time ago, I expressed my unease about pitch/intonation in the late recordings of Serge Chaloff, but found no one who was prepared to say about him the sort of things which are being said in this thread about Jackie McLean and Gigi Gryce. Any views on Serge in this context?

The Marquee?

Sonny's inclusion here of the very attractive "Sippin at Bells", recorded at Miles's first leader date in 1947 with Bird on tenor, reminds us of the bop roots of this hard bop pianist whose style derived ultimately from Bud Powell's. "Sippin'", a blues with altered changes of the sort which Bird and other boppers favored in the late forties, is perhaps a surprising choice for this 1958 hard bop date. Sonny had also selected the bop classics, "Two Bass Hit", "Be-Bop" and "Tadd's Delight", for his trio date with Blue Note the previous year.

Thelonious Monk, April in Paris/Live (Milestone twofer) With Charlie Rouse, John Ore and Frankie Dunlop in Paris in April 1961.

By "too flat" do you mean "too dull, or boring", or are you talking about problems of pitch? If the latter, I have no complaint about Jackie, but always find Gigi Gryce too sharp. Any views on this?

Yes, the Basie/CarterKansas City Suite is a superb album. I first heard it a few weeks ago on an archived radio show on oscartreadwell.com and decided it was a "must have". Amazon.uk was offering used copies from £55 ($110), but I found it on the French priceminister site (thanks for the recommendation, Niko!) for 10 euros ($15). Great to hear the suite is being played again!

Thelonious Monk. Piano solos on French Swing 10" LP recorded in Paris in 1954.

A fine book, although a glossary of current Americanisms would help the British reader! Seriously, it inspired me to go on to read the other books in his trilogy.

Sonny Buxton on KCSM. Now playing: Big Bags: Milt Jackson in a studio big band setting in 1962.

Looking forward to hearing this one online, David.

Jazz Line-Up live from BBC Radio 3. Now playing: "The Outlaw" from Horace Silver Live at Newport '58.

Interesting ! There's a picture of this group at Ronnie Scotts in the 'Fourty Five Year Anniversary' book (one of Val Wilmer's I think) but with Charles Tolliver in place of Turrentine. That's one heck of a lineup of great artists you saw at the Ernie Garside place, BillF My apologies! It was Tolliver and not Turrentine. Perhaps for such ancient memories, I should use IIRC more often!

Yes, Club 43 was the name of Garside's first jazz club - in Oxford Road, Manchester - and IIRC he kept the name for its successor, where I saw Mobley, in the now-disappeared Amber Street. A little more on this theme! Club 43 was originally located in a room in a pub called The Clarendon, which stood at 43, Oxford Road in Manchester's university district. I was a regular there around 1961 and I recall seeing the Tubby Hayes Quartet several times, with Terry Shannon on piano, Jeff Clyne on bass and Bill Eyden on drums. The acoustics and ventilation were dreadful, but at the age of 21 I didn't care. One story about this venue has got into print, in a recently published biography of Joe Harriott. Joe was calmly taking a cigarette break outside on the pavement while two women attacked each other violently. "Don't worry," said Joe to a fellow musician, "they're only fighting over me!" The Clarendon was demolished to make way for the development of what is now Manchester Metropolitan University and the jazz scene then shifted to the other side of the inner city, to Amber Street, where Ernie Garside opened a club. By now we were into the era of visiting American artists and I saw the following accompanied by a local trio, usually with Joe Palin on piano: Ben Webster, Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin, Hank Mobley, Leo Wright and Carmell Jones. The only full American group I saw at the club was the Max Roach Quintet with Tommy Turrentine, Odean Pope, Stanley Cowell and Jymie Merritt. Max harangued the audience about the role of the English in African American slavery and drew attention to his musicians' English surnames. I missed the Archie Shepp group, but Ed Dipple (later of Mole Jazz) was there and IIRC told me the group included Roswell Rudd and Jimmy Garrison.

Hank Mobley, No Room For Squares (Blue Note) Two 1963 sessions: 1) with Lee Morgan, Andrew Hill, John Ore and Philly Joe Jones 2) with Donald Byrd, Herbie Hancock, Butch Warren and Philly Joe Jones