BillF

Coleman Hawkins et son orchestre, Hollywod Stampede (Music for Pleasure - une filiale de Thorn-EMI)

Horace Silver Trio (Blue Note)

The Horace Silver Quintet, Silver's Blue (Epic)

Roulette's Message from Birdland put out by Mosaic is great! Recorded the year before this Newport appearance, it features two takes of "The Mark of Jazz", heard on the first video clip.

Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers (Blue Note 1518)

Reminder: "Brecon Jazz: Women in Jazz" on BBC 4 at 8:30 - 9 this evening.

I've just been listening to Lee Konitz's Inside Hi-Fi, which includes a session with him on tenor. Interesting! I love the two Bird sessions where he switches to tenor and Ornette on Tenor, of course, as well as Art Pepper's forays on tenor. The other day on "Bebop Spoken Here" from KBCS Bellevue, Seattle I heard Sonny Stitt on baritone for the first time. Far less technique, but still unmistakably Stitt! The session where Getz and Mulligan swap horns isn't well spoken of, so I haven't bought that one. It's an interesting experience to hear a saxophonist you know well on a different saxophone. Any thoughts on, or examples of, this phenomenon?

I particularly like the Kenton Orchestras of 1954-55 with arrangements by Bill Holman and star-studded personnel including Sam Noto, Stu Williamson, Buddy Childers, Frank Rosolino, Carl Fontana, Lennie Niehaus, Charlie Mariano, Davey Schildkraut, Bill Perkins, Mel Lewis and Stan Levey. There's a lot of this material on two Contemporary albums: Kenton Showcase and Contemporary Concepts. If you already like Art Pepper, a good way into Kenton is via Those Kenton Days (Definitive).

Don Cherry, Complete Communion (Blue Note)

The George Coleman Octet, Big George (Affinity)

Pepper Adams Quartet, Ephemera (Spotlite). Recorded in London in 1973 with the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis rhythm section of Roland Hanna, George Mraz and, of course, Mel himself. A really swinging album, which I don't think is available on CD. But I stand to be corrected on that!

Hank Mobley, Far Away Lands (Blue Note)

Kenny Dorham, Whistle Stop (Blue Note)

From BBC Radio 4's schedule for today: 1:30-2p.m. The Jazz Baroness. The story of Pannonica Rothschild who became a leading sponsor of bebop stars such as Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker.

Harold Land, Harold in the Land of Jazz (Contemporary/Boplicity)

Shorty Rogers and his Giants, Clickin' with Clax (Atlantic)

Lee Konitz, Timespan (Wave). Konitz solos taped by bassist Peter Ind between 1954 and 1976 and released on his own label.

Miles Davis, Seven Steps to Heaven (CBS)

The Amazing Bud Powell Vol 1 (Blue Note)

Charlie Parker on Dial Vol 1 (Spotlite)

Illinois Jacquet (Epic). (1962 sessions with Roy Eldridge and Sir Charles Thompson.)

Just finished the McCarthy novel. Felt I had to read it to sort out what happens in the movie!

Let's not forget the dedication to Basie of many West Coasters. Shorty Rogers Courts the Count is a beautiful album with ex-Basieite Harry Edison on trumpet and a mixture of Basie and Rogers numbers.

I remember the moment when I first heard Ornette - on a jazz record radio show in 1959. My first impressions were twofold: "Bird", I thought, and then, "madness". This is how Bird must have sounded inside the Camarillo institution, I mused. And, in truth, there is a hint of Ornette in the rough, unfinished cry of the "Lover Man" which Bird put on wax before they dragged him off to Camarillo. I quickly learnt to love Ornette and invested in seven albums recorded between 1958 and 1961 which I'm still listening to and marveling at now. So I've never had any problems with Ornette. Cecil Taylor, however, is something else. But that's another thread ... !

Red Callender and Elaine Cohen, Unfinished Dream: the Musical World of Red Callender