Ted O'Reilly

Chris, I've long loved that album (despite some "flexible" pitch), and thought the sound was terrific. I don't have a copy of it, or the others recorded in that series, and I can't pull the engineer's name from my memory, but the aural aspects of those sessions is natural and authentic, so he should be credited along side you, I think.

"Sims", not "Simms", dammit! It's right there in front of you. (Why is it so hard to spell names correctly? It's disrespectful, I say! )

So, how's the subway doin'?

I'm with Don Brown.... "Eena Eena". As in "Yma Sumac" -- Eema Sumac (or is it Amy Camus?).

In the original NYT article, the phrase "attempted petit larceny" turns up. I would have thought it would be "petty" -- is this an actual legal term in the USA?

Editorial cartoonist Signe Wilkinson has the answer to the Heston Question... http://www.uclick.com/feature/08/04/07/wpswi080407.gif

Damn; late again! What's the most important thing in comedy and jazz drumming..... timing!

This seems to be a good idea, but will the back catalogue stay there, or continue to be reissued?

There was another band called Spirits of Rhythm ?!?

Now, here's something: a sports writer (admittedly, of an earlier generation) who knew something about jazz, and contributed to the culture of an iconic course.... This comes from Toronto's Sunday Sun newspaper (2008/04/06). (Highlights in bold by me). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Turning point Augusta National's famed Amen Corner is often where fortunes, both good and bad, are reversed for Masters competitors By KEN FIDLIN Amen Corner. Sight unseen, the words themselves inspire immediate images of what this place must be. A place of uncommon beauty, of peace and tranquillity. A place that speaks perhaps of divine intervention. A place of cruel reality that demands so much of those who pass this way, where the dividing line between triumph and failure is so thin as to be invisible. A place of such moment that, if inclined, a quiet word or two with your deity of choice might be in order because you're going to need all the help you can get. Amen Corner is all of these things and more. If it has been said once, it has been said thousands of times: The Masters can be won only on the crucible of Augusta National's second nine on Sunday afternoon. If that is true, and it usually is, then the fitting for the famed green jacket begins at Amen Corner. For practical purposes, Amen Corner describes Augusta National's routing of the par-4 11th, par-3 12th and par-5 13th holes. For the first 20-something years of the famed golf course's existence, the three holes at the southwest corner of the property were known to the members as "the water loop." But the dramatic events of the 1958 Masters, involving Arnold Palmer so impressed legendary writer Herbert Warren Wind, then of Sports Illustrated, that he felt moved to give the place a more lyrical identity. In a 1984 interview with Golf Digest, Wind explained the origins of the nickname: "That 1958 Masters was a memorable one. It hinged on how Arnold Palmer, paired with Ken Venturi, played the 12th and 13th on the final day ... I felt that I should try to come up with some appropriate name for that far corner of the course where the critical action had taken place -- some colourful tag like those that Grantland Rice and his contemporaries loved to devise: The Four Horsemen, the Manassa Mauler, the House that Ruth Built, the Georgia Peach, and so on. "The only phrase with the word 'corner' I could think of (outside of football's 'coffin corner' and baseball's 'hot corner') was the title of a song on an old Bluebird record. On one side, a band under the direction of Milton (Mezz) Mezzrow, a Chicago clarinetist, had recorded 35th and Calumet -- most likely the site of a jazz joint in Chicago. The reverse side was Shouting in the Amen Corner. There was nothing unusual about the song, but apparently the title was catchy enough to stick in my mind. "The more I thought about it, the more suitable I thought the Amen Corner was for that bend of the course. My article, in the issue dated April 21, was called The Fateful Corner, and the opening sentence went like this: " 'On the afternoon before the start of the recent Masters golf tournament, a wonderfully evocative ceremony took place at the farthest reach of the Augusta National course -- down in the Amen Corner where Rae's Creek intersects the 13th fairway near the tee, then parallels the front edge of the green on the short 12th, and finally swirls alongside the 11th green ....' " As perfect as the name Amen Corner is, it didn't catch on in a popular sense for another 15 to 20 years and it wasn't until just this year, a half-century after Palmer's win and Wind's article, that a jazz aficionado from Atlanta named Richard Moore, after extensive investigation, revealed that Wind had been mistaken about the recording. Turns out Mezzrow never did a recording of Shouting At The Amen Corner. Several others did, however, and Wind must have got one confused with Mezzrow. He was not confused about the 1958 drama, however. Palmer, looking for his first Masters win, came to the par-3 12th on Sunday holding a one-stroke lead over Venturi. Palmer's tee shot plugged in the rain-soaked back fringe. In seeking a ruling, Palmer decided to play two balls. First he played the plugged ball and eventually made double-bogey five. Then he dropped a second ball at the place where the ball had plugged, chipped it up and made the putt for three. He then left the problem with the rules committee for a decision and promptly eagled the 13th. It wasn't until he was playing the par-5 15th that Palmer learned the rules officials had ruled in his favour. He went on to win his first of four green jackets. Before Palmer's time, the Masters was always a big event, but only among that small population that took big league golf seriously. Palmer's charisma, simultaneous with television bringing golf into people's living rooms, put the game and the tournament on the map and he, himself, believes it all began at that 12th hole in 1958. Palmer wasn't the first and is far from the last to have his fortunes reversed -- both good and bad -- while passing through Amen Corner. Next Sunday, a 72nd champion will be crowned in the 2008 Masters and he, too, will have found a way to negotiate his way past and over -- and maybe even through -- Rae's Creek to the title. Just as surely, someone or multiple someones, will leave their green-jacketed dream there. One of the aspects that adds to the allure and mystery of Amen Corner is the fact spectators can view the action only from afar. Because the holes are right up against the course boundary, there is no gallery access. The closest the patrons get to the 11th green is perhaps 50 yards away. When players are putting on the 12th green, they are as much as 150 yards removed from the mass of humanity. And then, on the 13th tee, they are even further from the crowd. This isolation from the galleries through the better part of three consecutive holes is unique in competitive golf and adds to Amen Corner's mystique. "It is one of the greatest names. It is the corner of the course where anything can happen," two-time champ Ben Crenshaw said last year. "It's immensely, almost alarmingly, quiet. The only thing you can hear is your heartbeat and the heartbeats of your fellow players and caddies. There is no spot like it in major championship golf." The 11th hole is a brute of a par-4, 490 yards in length and punctuated by a green that seems to want to kick every approach shot toward the beckoning waters of Rae's Creek. It was here, in 1987, that local boy Larry Mize broke Greg Norman's heart and won a playoff by chipping in from 140 feet for birdie. The 12th has often been described by players as the greatest par-3 in the world. Just 155 yards at its deepest pin position, the green is long and narrow, slanting away from the tee box, protected at the front by Rae's Creek, with bunkering both front and back. "I call the 12th the 'Hole of Vultures,' " three-time Masters champ Gary Player said. "The spectators collect on the hill behind the tee, many of them there for the day, cheering when a shot lands on the green and groaning in sympathy when a ball plunges into the water. It's the toughest short par-3 ever. For excitement, drama and heartbreak, there has never been another like it." "It can seem to play 30 yards longer at times due to the swirling winds," said Fred Couples, who is part of the hole's legend. When he won his green jacket in 1992, Couples' tee shot on Sunday landed on a steep bank and appeared headed into Rae's Creek until it came to rest, impossibly, on the slope. He chipped up and made par. "I think I'm safe in saying that was the biggest break I ever got in golf," Couples said. Some of the greatest theatre Augusta has to offer has played out at the banana-shaped 13th hole, a reachable par-5 that, at 510 yards, is one of the finest risk/reward propositions in golf. The green is well-protected by water in front and bunkering behind, but most players in the field have enough length off the tee to take a run at eagle if needed. But it still requires a precise approach. Bogey or worse awaits anything less than that. It's all part of the package -- the joys and the horrors -- wrapped up in Amen Corner. Herbert Warren Wind, much revered in the annals of golf and its chroniclers, died three years ago at the age of 88. His legacy lives on, down there amid the shouting at that Amen Corner. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- There's a terrific version of the song by The Spirits of Rhythm, BTW

I think you mean disposable razors. And you're right -- I remember Bic coming out with them around 1968 or '69.

Gee, I dunno, Dan. I know what you're saying, but it is a manufacturing problem. I think mgraham333 should have gone to the retailer first, but a lot of retailers these days (e.g. electronics) don't bother with any sort of guarantee, but boot you along to the manufacturer, who warrants the product.

Audio systems are just fine, as long as they don't get in the way of the music.

Without getting into a discussion of "gateway drugs", Kiener DID die of an overdose on the Rich band bus. I have an hour or more of Kiener's solo piano playing in Toronto. What a pianist! What a loss...

Well, thank you very much, Jazzolog, but in keeping with my reputation for being accurate, if not downright pedantic, I was never heard on the CBC. Well, as an occasional guest, but not as a host. My jazz career was on CJRT-FM in Toronto (these days called JazzFM91, a claim I'll argue with). I was at that Monterey concert too (Sept. 18, 1981). There was indeed a live broadcast of the concerts, and I have an off-the-air cassette of it, so I can't tell how well-recorded it actually was, given the broadcast quality, but it's a good souvenir. The Hi-Lo's (Don Shelton, Clark Burroughs, Bob Morse and Gene Puerling) with Don Haas (sp?) on piano; Marc Johnson on bass and Connie Kay on drums. Their set: Small Fry My Sugar (Is So Refined) Lady In Red Lulu's Back In Town Tenderly Come Rain Or Come Shine Secret Love Lazy Afternoon Rockin' Chair Rob McConnell and The Boss Brass finally got on stage for "The Breakfast Show" at about 1:30 in the morning, and the band had been travelling and up for about 26 hours: "We came from Toronto today. On a bus!" said Rob. Their set: Confirmation (Sam Noto, tpt; Moe Koffman, alto; Ed Bickert, gtr) Portrait of Jenny (Guido Basso, flug) My Bells (Jimmy Dale, pno) Just Friends (Rob McConnell, vtbn; Eugene Amaro, tnr; Sam Noto, tpt) Then, the Hi-Lo's came out and joined the band for two tracks they had recorded with The Boss Brass for MPS: Georgia Seems Like Old Times Then, the encore/closer, the theme Rob wrote for me (recorded live at the El Mocambo in Toronto) T.O. (Rob McConnell, vtbn; Ed Bickert, gtr) All the way through, the great bass work of Don Thompson, and Terry Clarke on drums -- 16 years to the day when they also ignited Monterey with the John Handy Quintet on Spanish Lady and If Only We Knew. More? www.tedoreilly.com

Yeah, Carl "Ziggy" Elmer, with Krupa and James and.... what else? And where did he get to? Did he die in the '50s?

I haven't seen a vote here for a hybrid: Wet and/or Dry. I travel a fair bit, and when in Switzerland about a dozen years ago had my Braun electric die on me, and it was going to cost more to repair it than buy a new one. But, while switchable to the North American voltage, I would have ended up with a cord that needed an adapter to work at home. The shopkeeper suggested I get get a battery-powered one for the duration, and suggested a Panasonic Wet/Dry. An electric razor (even battery) that you can use wet?? Yes! and while it's not great on the neck, the result: the best shave ever. It cost less than $50, and I'm on my third version now. I stick with the battery type (2 AAs you can buy anywhere) for the travel convenience--no recharger needed. The current one, Panasonic Pro-Curve ES4815s is just fine with me... (Oh: use the best shaving get out there, Aveeno).

I'm maybe misremembering, but wasn't it Starlite, not Spotlite?

FFA, I'm with you, but proudly own their recordings -- I've never understood people who can't hear the incredible musicianship of The Singers Unlimited (never mind The Hi-Lo's). I saw the creation of the album TSU did with Rob McConnell, as the four singers sang the guide tracks to the Boss Brass instrumental side. I would have been happy to release just those efforts, let alone the polished overdubs that created the choir. And Puerling was a master of that sort of studio production, probably equalling what George Martin did. Gene was underappreciated, believe me...

By the way, if you're not aware of Puerling, you can do some catchup at http://www.singers.com/arrangers/genepuerling.html

I've just heard, through Rob McConnell, that Gene Puerling died last Tuesday, just short of his 79th birthday. Puerling created and led the vocal groups The Hi-Lo's and The Singers Unlimited.. He was probably the best vocal arranger ever. I met Gene on several occasions, and he was among the truly nicest people around. I doubt that he had an enemy in the world, but he certainly had a ton of friends and admirers.

Me, contacts and the cheapest eyeglass frames I can find. My lenses are in 16 hours a day, and the glasses are for the walk from bathroom to bedroom, then lights out!

Chris' reference to Valaida Snow ("...a trumpeter and vocalist who had one of the most remarkable careers in jazz...") gives me the opportunity to let you know of a wonderful new book by Toronto jazz writer Mark Miller. "High Hat, Trumpet and Rhythm, The Life and Music of Valaida Snow" [The Mercury Press ISBN 1-55128-127-9] is Miller's eighth book, and like his others scrupulously researched (original research at that, not the cribbing from other writers) and written with clarity. His writing has an integrity that deftly separates fact from hyperbole (she was never in a concentration camp, but was "in custody" of the Danes, not Nazis) yet shows affection for his subject. A concise 186 pages, the book includes a discography, bibliography and index.

Vicks VapoRub...95% petroleum jelly. No wonder the price of oil's going up, at the rate I'm using the Vicks...

Vicks/RIP. Cause and effect?