David Ayers

So who can I call to see if I have had hip replacement therapy. I mean, I don't think I have, but... I need to really know for sure...

Yuk.

Hey stop picking on me! I didn't invent this use of the phrase, that's all I am prepared to say (except possibly under torture).

No no ... I meant that EMI's interest in Mosaic might be purely fiscal, not creative.

That's rather worrying... EMI is in deepshit, no? Robbie Williams didn't turn out to be gold-shitting donkey they were hoping for and besides him they don't have any good horses in their stable... I dunno. Maybe it isn't an issue. It may be no more than an actuarial matter, that would remain unaffected even if EMI get taken over. I should think the business is worth very little in comparison to EMI as a whole.

Yeah shipping is a little high, certainly to the UK. That said the weak dollar is working in their favor at the moment, I should think.

Am I right in thinking that Mosaic is half-owned by EMI? If so is it not the health of EMI we need to be watching, as much as the independent standing of their half-owned subsidiary?

I can't explain why, but I find this reassuring...

I applaud the enterprise. I also wonder whether 9 CDs of this will stand up. Coltrane's Village Vanguard tapes came out only in selection on single LPs in the first instance. They were highly regarded and eventually the rest of the material was issued. In fact large segments of the complete VV material (as currently available on 4 CDs) are not really so good, but more of interest against the context of the best known tracks. My point is that large sets of live material *used* to be issued to cater to the fans who already loved the individual issues. I just wonder exactly who such a set will reach and why - whether a single CD of the best segment or segments of the concerts would have done better commercially and in terms of getting the music known - or whether the implicit message is that it is the whole project that counts, not really any particular outstanding part of the result, in which case perhaps the DVD is all anyone actually needs? Anyway good luck - depending on price I will probably buy this myself.

I d n't re ly s e wha he pro l m is.

Nothing I've heard either. But I am not very reliable.

There ought to be.

This thread is just going to open up Pandora's Box.

A Latin jazz history book? Miles Davis Gloriosus. (this one could be quite hard to keep up)

Maybe I haven't followed it closely enough. Is every critic who gave Hatto a favorable review now behaving this way? Or is the anger against a particular set of critics who are refusing to eat humble pie? Or were there only those few to begin with? The Gramophone put out Barrington-Coupe's version which significantly softens the reality. They were pushing Hatto even when the doubts were in full flow, and one of their reviewers Jeremy Nicholas published a letter saying that anyone with doubts must supply evidence that would 'stand up in a court of law' that the recordings were not genuine, or keep quiet. To me that is fatuous bluster, where the intelligent and honest thing to do would have been to take the reservations seriously. Personally I never for one moment believed in the things that Nicholas and his ilk were saying (greatest recorded legacy since Richter etc) and found it bizarre that inconsistencies noticeable to the naked ear (as reported by others - I never got pulled in) were just brushed off by 'experts' (Nicholas, Jed Distler, Bryce Morrison). The Gramophone's ringing endorsement of Hatto supplied the copy text for all the obituaries (Nicholas spewed it all out again in The Guardian, Bryce Morrison in Gramophone, ). These guys should fall on their swords but are out in force defending their gullibility. IMO they should apologise and then vanish. I'll add that the claim that these records are great has been often repeated to defend the offending critics, but in fact few have heard them (except for the famous concerto recordings by Ashkenazy, Bronfman et al) so it is not at all clear that these really are great recordings. In any case the critics defence has been that they were picked for their anonymity - hardly a sign of greatness. I also wonder how many of these recordings the admiring critics ever actually heard, and ever possessed in other than CD-R or white label form. They have repeated that there are 120 CDs in this 'great legacy' but have they actually worked through them all? I suggest not. I'll stop now, except to say that my attempt to add a very mildly worded query about the role of critics in the Hatto fiasco to the Gramophone website was censored. That is why I am not impressed by their continued manipulation of the news.

Treat yourself to this Interview with Joyce Hatto from 2006 if you want to try to peer through the web of deceit. Regarding Tom's point on blind tests etc., that is not the point. The critics who backed Hatto responded with ignorant bluster to the many people who pointed out the discrepancies of style, instrument and venue. On the subject of instrument, listen to Hatto's deceitful response in this interview to attempts to test her claim she has been recording on Rachmaninov's own pianos [yes, plural]. Incidentally, these dunces have continued in the same vein, by reproducing hubby's further lies about how his wife knew nothing, he did it for love, it started with just patching, etc - all quite obviously total lies but the press just trotted it all out.

Wow. I never knew William Carlos Williams was a Mosaic fan...

I hope that's a joke and you just left off the smiley. My humour is dry and smileyless. And unfunny. I've got it all.

Personally I hate the people who hang back 200 yards behind you like your going to slam on the brakes suddenly like a lunatic. It's pure disrespect. Maybe I need a longer range weapon to deal with them?

Does it contain the 2 extra tracks? They are really fine. Which extra tracks? The Japanese remaster TOCJ 6560 and all other CD reissues of Smithville that I know of have only 5 tracks. "Tunesmith" and "Au Privave" . First Issued on "The Other Side of the 1500 Series " ( Japan) . Thanks. Damn.

I didn't say they had fraudulent intent, but I do say that when pushed they started bluffing their readers. They had no evidence of the provenance of these recordings but called out the sceptics to supply evidence of a type and standard that they themselves could not supply. Although these recordings were mostly supposed to have been made in the same venue on the same piano by the same pianist and with the same engineer, they were simply unable to identify differences in all of these things which were pointed out by sceptics. Even allowing for the collective tin ear of these CD hoarding geeks (oops, I mean of "the world's leading critics", as it says on their book), the sheer implausibility of one pianist suddenly producing the greatest single recorded oeuvre in history ought to have been questioned by them as it was by others - it was wrong to try to shout down such doubt which was self evidently correct (and which by the way led most sensible collectors to ignore the Concert Artist recordings). So I agree, they look fools because that is what they are, but given the extent and articulacy of doubt they were wrong to get all huffy when challenged and should never have endorsed Hatto in the first place.

This man has admitted fraud and all his comments should be read as attempts to manipulate. He even had the Gramophone (never missing an opportunity to be sycophantic around the 'music industry' - in this case just a reflex) saying that what music fans wanted to know now was which recordings were genuine. First, we can assume that none are genuine - in any case no evidence presented by the company could be regarded as genuine. Second, people who bought them want and are owed a full refund, not just 'the truth'. Gramophone backed this swindler and one of their reviewers was allowed to challenge sceptics to supply 'evidence that would stand up in court' that the recordings were not genuine. He provided no evidence himself. Gramophone is not quite in the dock over this, but they definitely took the wrong side and now look like mugs who couldn't tell the difference between different artists, different pianos, different venues, and different recording set-ups (sometimes within the same piece) - all the things that recorded music reviewers are supposed to know.

Why not go with the 1500 Yen edition of Smithville (TOCJ 6560)?

Maybe you should just write to Fresh Sounds?