Big Al

Many of the members of that forum were booted off the Hoffman forum. Among others, I'll bet.....

DISC TWO Track 1: Somewhere, Oscar Peterson and Art Tatum are smiling. Or, in the context of the name of the song, “bouncing!” Tracks 2 and 3 are nice, but nothing that really grabbed my attention. Track 4: WHOA! Give me a groove like this ANY day of the week! YOW! Love that guitar sound! Peter Leitch? I *MUST* find out where this comes from! Oh this groove could last the entire rest of this BFT and it would become my favorite BFT in a heartbeat!!!! No, not Leitch. Maybe Russell Malone? I’d even go so far as to say Pat Martino or even George Benson, if I thought Benson was still capable of something like this. Track 5: Pleasant enough. Again, nothing too memorable. But I’ll take this over disc one track 8 any day of the week! Track 6: At first, I thought it was a Blue Mitchell Riverside date, but now I’m convinced it’s Miles. But the focus seems to be more on the piano player! And that drummer! Wait... is this one of those tracks that Miles & Gil did in the 60’s (with Shorter/Hancock/Carter/Williams) that never saw the light of day until the Miles/Gil box came out? But that doesn’t sound at all like Herbie on the piano. This one’s gonna be interesting to find out! Track 7: Nice bluesy guitar, I guess. Eh.... Track 8: Oh, fercryinoutloud! I’ve heard this one, too! Drat! Drat! Drat! Gonna kick myself for not knowing this one, too! Track 9: Sounds like they tried to take four or five different unfinished ideas and cram them into one song. Good on them for not making the mistake of trying to stretch out those unfinished ideas into a whole record. Then it’d be just another BS&T album. This still doesn’t do too much for me. Track 10: Okay, I guess. I’m sorry to say that this disc is being uneventful for me. Track 11: Once that guy started yodeling, I stopped caring about the rest of this track! Yeesh!!!! Track 12: Sounds like a Bill Frisell thing. I love electric piano, especially when it’s all reverb-y like this! A violin? So far, I’m really digging the combination of the sounds. (five minutes later) Okay, the screeching coulda stopped a LONG time ago! Do these people not have internal edit buttons? Ow, OW, that’s painful! NEXT!!!! Track 13: MMMMMmmmmmmm!!!!! Another nice closer! Transferred beautifully from vinyl! Gotta love it! Maybe a Konitz Verve thing? Well, once again I’ve shown just what a boring conservative jazz dilettante I truly am. Challenge me and I turn into one of those old curmudgeons who says “You kids! Get offa my lawn and quit makin’ that awful racket!” But this disc would’ve been worth the admission price for track 4 ALONE, and for that, I thank you profusely! Now let’s see what everyone else has to say about disc 2!

DISC ONE Track 1: Well, as someone who has put music of a tenuous connection to jazz on his past BFTs and is contemplating the same for my BFT next month, I really have no room to question anyone else’s choice. That said, what the hell is this???? Did I upload/download the right thing? Track 2: NOW we’re talkin’! Has that great 60’s Miles Quintet vibe that I dig so much! I wanna say this is something from the Bobby Hutcherson Mosaic Select. No, I take that back: that tenor trill is unmistakably Joe Henderson. Sounds too recent to be a Milestone thing, so maybe something from his Verve years? Track 3: A very nice “Night and Day!” Oh, who was that guy who did the soundtrack for the Sean Penn movie loosely based on Django? Yeah, that guy. That’s who it is! Track 4: Groovy little samba! Man, I am enjoying this with each passing track! No clue on the players, but I’m gonna kick myself once I find out who the trumpet player is. I *know* I’ve heard this before! What the heck is that brass combo of Dixieland and samba towards the end??? Track 5: This may be even closer to that Miles groove than track 3. Heck, even the drummer sounds like Tony Williams! Wouldn’t that be something if it is? Trumpeter, if it isn’t Freddie Hubbard, sure wants to sound like him. Track 6: Bill Evans, or a reasonable facsimile! Very nice, nonetheless. When I think of terrific piano trio jazz, it sounds something like this! Track 7: Got off to an auspicious enough start, with that lone trumpet note being reminiscent of the opening to Artie Shaw’s version of “Star Dust.” Didn’t think the tempo would ever get above a rubato but then it started a very leisurely pace. Very nicely done. Maybe it is “Star Dust” after all! Track 8: This is my LEAST favorite.... no, I can’t even give it a favorite tag: tracks that start off with everyone blowing their brains out as loudly and incoherently for as long as they can. I just wanna scream “GET ON WITH IT, ALREADY!!!!” Okay, now that I’ve had my little rant, and now that they’ve finally gotten on with it, I.... I..... ay-yai-yai-yaiieeee. All they did was add a beat. Kinda. Sorta. NEXT!!! Track 9: Okay, terra firma reached. Ooooooooh, I like those Ellington-type orchestral voicings! Dang, that even sounds like Clark Terry! Has a similar late-night feel as track 7. I love a slow groove like this. Nobody overplays it, yet no one allows themselves to be dragged down by it, too. OH wow! That sounds like Ben Webster!!! Oh I can tell I’ll be looking for this one soon! Favorite track so far!!! Track 10: Oh fercryinoutloud! This one should be so easy to identify and yet..... {{{sigh}}} Once again exposed for the know-nothing about the music I love. Aw heck: late Ella? Something from her Pablo years? Joe Pass on the guitar? Here, care for some straws I’m grabbing at? Track 11: The beginning almost got me jumping & shouting like track 8, but then came that irresistible infectious samba/calypso/whatever that just makes me bounce with joy! Fifteen minutes of this stuff? I hope it’s as promising as its beginning would have me believe! (ten minutes later) {{{mega-sigh}}} I’m guessing the piano player was the leader on this date, as it’s the only reason I can come up with that would explain why nobody in the studio that day told him/her to stop with the piano-pounding: who else would’ve thought it would be a good idea to let him/her noodle incoherently and cacophonically for the last 4,000 hours..... Track 12: Very nice! Dare I say: Wynton and father in that lovely duet album that came out as I first getting into jazz. I need to revisit that again. Nice way to close disc 1! Now on to disc 2 and reading disc 1 comments! So far so good, DrJ!

Wow, that's right about the age I figured out what Joel was saying all these years and promptly lost all respect for his music and especially his words. ******* A track called "Look No Further" from an album called No Strings (With Strings by Ralph Burns and His Orchestra made me feel all kinds of melancholy. After hearing it for the first time, all I kept remembering was the Peanuts episode "She's a Good Skate, Charlie Brown," the scene where Woodstock whistles "O Mio Babbino Caro" as Peppermint Patty ice skates. (no, I don't know squat about opera; Google and Wikipedia make finding answers so easy these days)

My thoughts exactly.

but isn't Canyon Lady in the second half? I also like the album with Alice Coltrane a lot... these might be my favorite albums besides Power to the People, Tetragon and In Japan Man, I need to dig this box out again. I like the second half of the box, has a very CTI feel to it, IMO, which I really enjoy!

Teddy Wilson, discs 2 thru 4. Just diggin' on the Jo Jones sides!

I like the Hoffman forum. I don't go there very often, but my only gripe about that place is the toll it takes on my wallet. But then, I'm as OCD as they come, so all the attention to detail doesn't faze me a bit. It all seems normal to me.....

I just realized your avatar is from A THOUSAND CLOWNS. Man, I *love* that movie! "Hello, is this good news or money? No? Goodbye."

Tried a leaf-blower for the first time this past fall.... that's more work than just raking the leaves!!!

She couldn't even smile?

Agreed. I also think it was one of the best halftime shows since U2's inspiring performance after 9/11. Granted, there's been a lotta crap in those intervening years, thus lowering the bar considerably. BUT, like Ray sez: it was real. It was from the heart. Townshend looked like he was having the time of his life, and if the Townshend of the 60's had seen this and stormed the stage (which he would've had every right to do), I don't know that the old Townshend could take him down, but it'd be a helluva fight. Cometothinkofit, I believe that fight goes on in Pete's head every day! Look, I saw 'em in '89. The only reason that show was worth the bread was being able to see my hero Entwistle live. I pretty much focused on him the whole show, because the rest of the show, band, ensemble, song selection SUCKED. Left a real bad taste in my mouth and I truly figured them to be done. Sunday night not only showed that they still had the energy, but also the heart. I believe a big part of that is the newfound empathy between Daltrey & Townshend. Did anyone see that "Amazing Journey" documentary? The last bit documenting how Roger and Pete became much closer after John's death was particularly moving. I was almost in tears when they showed Roger & Pete performing "Tea & Theater" alone. When this is all you've done for almost 50 years, it's nice to be able to still do it, if not well then at least with guts & balls. Hope they die before they get old? Well, now their old, but instead of dying, it would appear that they're looking back, and saying "FUCK YOU!" Or, to paraphrase a song from The Who By Numbers, "Hi all you punks, I'm old but I'm spry, hand me my checkbook and here's mud in your eye!" The old farts are alright, baby!

Holy cow, that was fast! Mailed from zen on Friday the 5th from the New England area, arrived at my house in the Dallas/Ft Worth area yesterday! Kudos to the US Mail! And heap even bigger thanks on zen! Mint condition doesn't even begin to describe the CD: it looks like it literally left the shrink wrap before packaging! Thanks again, zen!

You And Lee is Now With Me! Thanks again, Pete!

Well, other than MG, I'm guessing everyone else's download has been alright. Mike, I gotcha covered! Check your PM box!

On the contrary: the track names are meant to be "peaked" at.

Is anyone else having trouble opening track 6 on disc 2? I just added you to an ongoing PM-discussion with the links. Let me know whether or not you receieve the notification.

Download or discs?

No Strings (with Strings) - Ralph Burns and his Orchestra Very nice! That Mel Lewis album didn't do much for me. I was gonna spin it again to see if it did, but I must've sold it. Oh well.... Ooooh... sounds nice!

The discs arrived today and have already previewed disc one. DrJ's done a fantastic job, even if there are a coupla tracks I don't personally dig (my own hangups; some of y'all are gonna be all over those)! Hopefully, I can get 'em uploaded tomorrow!

I rib on the guy a lot, but I'll tell you that Schaap's broadcast/tribute to Max Roach after Roach passed was some of the most moving and heartfelt radio I've ever heard.

Here's the list so far: Thom Keith The Magnificent Goldberg Bill Barton (download) Bright Moments seeline (download) Hot Ptah (discs) If there's no format by your name, let me know how you want your copy. Hopefully we get more players, cuz I'm anitipating being ready to start the discussion on Saturday.

PM coming on the Thigpen

I can't eat Macadamia nuts without thinking "very salty!"

Just to clarify: are you talking about the 50's Teagarden or the Roulette Teagarden?