Ted O'Reilly

He got me to quit smoking back in the late '60s. He was appearing as a solo artist at the old Town Tavern in Toronto and when I was interviewing him I had a coughing fit and had to stop the tape. I explained I had tried to quit before, but always came back to it -- I said "I guess I don't have the will to do it." He replied "We all have the will, we just don't have the will to use it. Use your will!" I took it to heart, went cold turkey and stopped a 50 a day habit. Thanks for the music, and the advice, Jon...

That's Fridays...the rest of the week he's reading and listening.

I have that Teddy Wilson box from Storyville, from when it was released, and have probably not listened to it all since I got it. It's an odd long box, and doesn't sit on a shelf with the other Wilsons I have. As a result, I overlook it, though it has lots of really nice music. I was musing today about my favourite clarinetist Edmond Hall (some days it's Pee Wee) and remembered the things that Ed did with Wilson, including some sessions in this Wilson long box. So, a listen to CD 2 for some Wilson Café Society sextet sides done for the Muzak transcription service in 1944, and then on to CD 3 and four tracks noted as "Recorded at Embers, New Your, December 31, 1953-54" with Wilson, Hall, Arvell Shaw and Bert Dahlander. But wait! for the first time, I listened to this with earphones and son-of-a-gun, this session is in stereo: piano hard left, clarinet hard right and bass/drums centre-ish. 1953/54? not likely... The invaluable Hall bio/discography "Profoundly Blue" by Manfred Selchow notes the likely source. Shortly after Hall left the Louis Armstrong band, Selchow says: Back in New York, Ed Hall joined Teddy Wilson's trio as a guest artist at the Embers (161 East 54th St.) for a few nights. Selchow documents it as Aug. or Sep. 1958, tape only and lists four more tracks that do not appear on the Storyville package. That it is stereo leads me to believe the 1958 date, not the New Year's Eve date indicated.

That's as I recall it...Canadian Columbia did a version of the Japanese 2LP, but if I recall it was devoid of discographical info, perhaps because no one did a translation from the Japanese... And I think the sound wasn't very good.

Toronto bassist Steve Wallace writes wonderfully about jazz and music in general in his blog http://wallacebass.com/ and writes lovingly about his favourite sport, baseball...

...maybe there are really *61 of them, including Roger "Sonny" Maris!

Why the asterisks, gregmo?

I hope the piano was tuned for Ella's gig. It wasn't for Oscar Peterson's 1955 recording at Zardi's. That took years and years to issue too. It was one of his best performances of the period, but oh, that piano! By the end of disc two, it's cringe-worthy.

I guess I read too literally, but I see "AI" in this font and read Al -- you know, as in Albert or Alan... Try this: AI and Al. (But I do hope that Albert will make me a God!)

My experience as a jazz radio broadcaster probably colours my opinion, but over 4 decades and producing/recording more than 500 jazz events, I've found that there's a special quality to these types of recordings. The players are in their natural element, just playing as they wish, without the pressures of the studio to consider ("Make it perfect! Look at the clock -- we've got to get it before three o'clock!", etc.). Yet, they know it's being recorded so there's not going to be just run-of-the-mill playing. And, it's intended to be a bit ephemeral: just aired once or twice so y'know, it's not for all-time. (Except it is! )

Other than Torrie Zito, the only non-Finn is the Canadian drummer Terry Clarke. Never travel without your own razor!!!

I find the sound is acceptable, if not exciting. It's noted it was done from the original tapes by "Verve New York" though there are no specific engineers credited.

The liner notes for that project were done by a friend from here in Toronto, Ron Gaskin. In addition to writing poetry, he used to be a manager at the main store of the Canada-wide record store chain, Sam The Record Man. He knows his music! This collection was instigated by the Canadian branch of Verve/Universal...an affordable, yet thorough release.

Great guitarist, and a nice guy. In 1991 I taped a Toronto concert by Niels Lan Doky for radio, with John on guitar. It was John's first performance of the music, and he shone! Doky got it released as 'The Toronto Concert' (Maracatu MAC 940 003) and it starts with me introducing the band, and John noodles a bit in the background, so I like to think I had John Abercrombie as my accompanist...

That's right, Cyril. Pat LaBarbera plays both Lucky's tenor and soprano. I have some pictures of Pat playing the tenor, but don't have the ability to add them here....

Thanks... I missed that one, have to look into it!

Peter... are these tracks those in the Castro box set "Lush Life - A Musical Journey"? Or are there others I don't know about?

Mixed, indeed: "repressed" or "re-pressed".... What a difference a dash makes.

True, that. And it's why I was surprised at the sales response. They were buying a visual product, unseen. As an aside, it sure hit home that the cost of distribution of Physical Media is very high...in our case, via couriers, not mail, a full one-fourth of the book's cost. And I know I've blanched at buying some CDs for 12 bucks and paying 8 bucks delivery plus customs charges... No wonder downloading is popular!

You might be right, David. I'll admit to being a bit concerned about the state of jazz-as-I-knew-it and all that, so the book is a bit of a valedictory for me. Pat LaCroix and I did a CBC radio interview about the book which was broadcast across the province and within a half-hour 105 copies were sold on the website. I didn't anticipate THAT at all. Even though I spent four decades as a jazz broadcaster (retiring 15 years ago) I guess I underestimated radio's reach! To me, the music is everything, and Pat's assurances that there would be photo-fans went right over my head, and they surely made up a large part of the customers. It is a lovely-looking publication!

Over the last three-and-a-half years, I've been working with photographer/occasional singer Pat LaCroix on a book of portraits of Toronto jazz musicians. Not any sort of a jazz encyclopedia, just brief bios (which I've written, along with a preface) accompanying b&w shots of 100 of Toronto's best from over the years. It's a project that all involved have done pro bono and indeed have put money into... Every cent of the sales is going to two charities -- a jazz one, and a palliative care facility (Pat's wife succumbed to cancer during the project, and it was at her urging in the beginning that we undertook it). We found some real angels in the jazz community who kicked in for the paper and the printing, so the production costs (and boy, that's a lot of money per book when you go First Class all the way) were covered. Now, who does such a thing? 1. A dying artform, Jazz, some say. 2. A book? That dead-tree medium? A coffee table book at that? 3. A local topic too, just Toronto? For various reasons (including that neither Pat nor I know a damn bit about any form of Real Business) we decided it would be 500 copies, and that's that. We'd be lucky to sell them, for the 3 reasons above. But we wanted to do it, as a thank-you and payback to the jazz community that we've been part of for the past five decades. The beauty part of the story is that all 500 copies, at $60 each sold out in less than a month. That's right, all gone, and $30,000 is going to charity... We had to shut down the online ordering this morning, but the website's still up, showing some samples and a brief talk about the project by Pat and me. www.torontojazztreasures.com Toronto jazz fans: Thank You! from Pat LaCroix and Ted O'Reilly

Saddened to hear that...he seemed to me to be one of the good ones.

The concert was at the Jubilee Auditorium in Edmonton, with an audience of about 1000 persons... I think it might be the only concert the quartet did, with other performances being in clubs. (If allowed, the recording is Gambit 69280.)