bertrand

To all our friends in London and the U.K., I wish you courage and strength to get through this difficult time. This world has gone mad. Sincerely, Bertrand.

I've been trying to get someone interested in doing a Massey retrospective for years. I may (finally) have a solid lead, so keep your fingers crossed. The wanadoo site is definitely the best inventory of his compositions; it's pretty much complete. Lou Donaldson told me (twice) that Massey is the real composer of 'My Little Suede Shoes', although someone else told me it's based on a French children's song. If Lou is correct, it's really a shame that Cal never got the credit for this oft-recorded piece - he would have lived a lot more comfortably. Hardman's version of 'Assunta' is OK, but Freddie's is a classic. Wayne's solo on this track is breathtaking. The Cal Massey playlist on my iPod has 24 tunes, which makes it one of the world's largest repositories of Massey compositions I still need to add some tracks. Bertrand.

I saw Tyler in the mid-80s in Paris at the American Church (with a French bass and drums). He played baritone and tenor. They did one set of Monk, and one set of originals (plus 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home'). It was fabulous. Bertrand.

Joe Chambers is probably my favorite of all, although there are dozens mentioned above that I love as well. Bertrand.

Lazaro, Jeff McMillan is the author of the article in Current Musicology. I need to get a copy of that. I hope it's still available. Bertrand.

1. Burnt Weeny Sandwich is my favorite. 2. Uncle Meat (the bonus track is junk, I agree). 'Prelude to King Kong' is fabulous. 3. One Size Fits All is also excellent, as well as most of Roxy and Elsewhere. 4. Freak Out has some great stuff on it, some not so great. VERY interesting use of vibraphone instead of piano. 5. Absolutely Free is mostly excellent. 6. Bongo Fury is the first I ever heard, and I still have a soft spot for it. Bertrand.

I'll ask my dumb question again, because it got buried. Is 'thesi' the plural of thesis? Thanks, Bertrand.

Elmo Hope's Informal Jazz (5/7/56) with Coltrane and Mobley appears on the Fantasy 2-fer All-Star Sessions, along with most of the tracks from Homecoming. Since the tunes from Homecoming are jumbled on this CD with respect to the original LP, I was wondering if this was the case for Informal Jazz as well. The four tracks in CD order are: Weeja Polka Dots And Moonbeams On It Avalon Is this the LP order as well? Thanks, Bertrand.

Upping this, if only because I feel like I'm in a dialogue with myself! Bertrand.

Forget me! It's the shit he said about Butch Warren. Bertrand.

I was not a witness to the Brookmeyer fracas, but I know that I wil NEVER buy a record by Danny D'Imperio Bertrand.

One more thought: has anyone noticed that Wayne is essentially AWOL on the two-minute improvised quartet track 'Tinker Bell'. At first, I thought he was completely missing, but this morning I caught a couple of notes in the last five seconds. Bertrand.

If you ever eat at Panera (good sandwiches on delicious bread), you will have the pleasure of hearing all the great stuff for this is mostly what they play, especially Blue Note material (I was told they have a deal with EMI), but also Verve, OJC you name it. Dex, Lee Morgan, Hank Mobley, Miles, Max, I have haeard all of them there. I like to play blindfold tests with myself when I take my son there (which is often), but of course I can't verify the results. The music is not selected by the employees, thet're just given something form the Corporate office. Good food, great music, I highly recommend this place. Bertrand.

1. Anyone listened to the concert with Jason Moran yet (link above)? It's fantastic. Very interesting to hear a different piano player in this context. 2. Finally picked up the CD (gave up on waiting for the bonus cut). I love the way Wayne is playing with Miles' 'It's About That Time' during his solo on 'Over Shadow Hill Way'. Bertrand.

To follow up on what Mike posted, there is also some great footage of Jackie teaching in the Jackie McLean on Mars video. Fascinating stuff - he gets into a heated debate with his students concerning the relative merits of Hot Dog vs. Sun Ra. He also says at the beginning that Dewey Redman taught him an exercise to strengthen his embouchure. Bertrand.

1. Did ANYONE tape this? Sounds like a great show! 2. Jackie actually wrote a theme song that was used for this show for a while in the early seventies. It was even copyrighted, but not issued (that I know of). Did they play his theme in this episode? Gil Noble was in the audience when Jackie played at the Iridium on 5/28/04. During Bobby or Grachan's solo, Jackie got off the stage and went over and gave Gil a big hug. Bertrand.

So Drum Suite is Drum Suite LP + 3 tracks with Ira Sullivan (one of which is a never before issued alternate). Hope it shows up at yourmusic.com Bertrand.

Soul Stream, 1. There is such a government historical project - the Smithsonian Oral history project. I believe they reside at the Smithsonian archives American History Museum. I don't have the web site handy. It may be on semi-hiatus due to budget issues. 2. Javier Gonzales did his Masters' on John Patton. That one is definitely at IJS - I read it there. There are a lot of interesting thesi at IJS (Mobley also). I've only had time to skim through them. We should work out an arrangement with Rutgers to have access to them. University Microfilms probably won't work, because these are 'only' Master's thesi. On the other hand, they are probably owned by Rutgers, so there should be no issue of getting authors' permissions, as sleazy as that statement sounds. I'm a bit sick today, so I may be a bit incoherent. Mike may point out several flaws in what I stated above. But the bottom line is, there are some 'books' out there on Morgan, Patton, Mobley, and this may be as close as we get to bios of these guys. We should pursue this. Bertrand.

Mike mentions three people writing books on Lee. I know of two who have actually made considerable headway, and will get something out eventually, one in the U.S. and one in France. I have helped them out as well with whatever info I had access to, especially concerning the unrecorded tunes I found at the copyright office. For the third, he is probably one of several that I know of who have started such projects; I don't know how far they have gotten. In the interim, Jeff McMillan did his Masters' at Rutgers on Lee. Most of the resulting thesi (is this the correct plural?) can be found at IJS; perhaps his as well? Bertrand.

According to Mike Fitzgerald's KB discography, this is his seventh recording session. Bertrand.

John, Good luck with the move! All the best, Bertrand.

Can one use the same computer to load two different iPods? I assume you would need two different libraries so that each iPod can load different music. Right now, I'm just using the library and loading from there - nothing fancy. I haven't got around to storing all my CDs on an external drive and loading a subset each time. Does my question even make sense? I've had a bad day... Thanks, Bertrand.

Don't mention the war! Bertrand.

For those of you who have reservations about Danilo's playing with Wayne (I personally do not), this might be of interest: http://www.abc.net.au/dig/stories/s1391985.htm From what I've been told, it was a one-time sub. Bertrand.

Happy birthday, Barak! Bertrand.