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The last record Charlie Parker made, the december session with Billy Bauer......

Maybe I scrolled too fast, but is it possible that THE GREAT AL FOSTER is not listed ? He must have made many many records and last not least, he is maybe my favourite drummer.

Great Picture. When I saw Wayne Shorter around 2005 he still looked younger than 71 or 72 that he was. Here is is much older, but looks fine and happy. Reading that the opera is about greek-mythology I think about most BN albums I have from Wayne Shorter and listen very much to them: Many titles are dedicated to some mythology and you can hear it in the music. It sounds great to me, even if I´m not really into mythology, but the music speaks for itself. I think, Wayne Shorter has been quite a difficult personality, I read the book about his live, and when he says something or este interviewed, I don´t really understand everything he says, it´s some heavy complicated stuff.

Ebenfalls tolle Scheibe. Wahnsinnsbesetzung.

Just great !

I think Monk, who was quite a strange and difficult personality, could be very very nice to youngsters. I think he was impressed that a 16 year old Danny Scher organized all that. And I remember I read somewhere, that in 1969, when he had that very young drummer, the son of bassist Herman Wright, the drummer still had to finish school work during the tour, and Monk somehow even supervised Wright´s school work. On a film you see him, how he talks to two very young girls and writes on a paper "Forever: Thelonious Monk" for them, and I think it was on an airport.

Both were so great. And too bad that they died so early. I had thought that the early death of jazzman was mostly Jazzmasters of the 40´s. Until the shock news in 1989 that Woody Shaw had died. I had the wrong illusion that the younger jazzmen were sober and drugs had come out of fashion. I think I read this from Art Blakey once. He said the youngsters that work for him are stone sober and drink only orange juice and stuff like that....

Wasn´t there a Connoisseur CD of "The Lost Sessions" . I missed that, but heard later that it has rejected Dameron Sessions from 1961, I think even Sam Rivers is on it. But somewhere I heard or read that it was rejected because the ensemble passages were a mess. That´s really a pity and a shame since BN really gave the artists time to rehearse properly and why didn´t Dameron, who always had the best arrangements and ensembles fail on it, more so since it seems he really had´nt much work in the early 60´s. The only Dameron album that came out then "Magic Touch" was a big dissapointment for me, since Dameron didn´t play piano. Some may say Dameron was not the greatest pianist, but I love his unique style, it makes me happy to listen to it. Why did Bill Evans play on that. He maybe fine for those who are his biggest fans and there are millions, but it has nothing to do with Tadd Dameron.....

Great photo of great stars. Miles Davis recorded a lot with J.J. from 1950-1954. But I think that 1961, 62 was not the most creative period in Miles´live. The old hardbop was beginning to become a routine, and gettin great artists like J.J. Johnson, Hank Mobley and Sonny Stitt in his band didn´t help much. For me it started with "At The Blackhawk". I loved that double album when I bought it as a youngster, but now I don´t find so much pleasure listening to it, it somehow bores me. Miles had to wait one more year to find guys like Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, Tony Williams and first George Coleman until at last he got Wayne..... to develope further....

Many of Hank´s early BN recordings from 1955-1957 were not easy to find. Almost all of them I have from Japan, some of them mini LP Covers.

I must admit I don´t have so many recordings from the most recorded drummer Shelly Manne. Maybe it´s because my list of West Coast recordings is quite small.

All three BN Thad Jones albums are very nice. I saw Thad Jones only once with the Thad Jones- Mel Lewis Big Band

I also listend to it recently. Chet still played beautiful. I saw Chet live late in 1987 and he also sounded great.

I´m sure it is Bird´s voice. This was in 1948, I think Bird´s voice became deeper in later years, as I heard it from 1953 recordings.

I also have this LP, but it´s from the music of the film. There was a first LP with music from the film score, and the tunes that were not published on the first LP are on the BN LP. But from the few activities of Dexter AFTER the Film, that means after 1985 there is nothing recorded.

And Dexter played only one tune. Well, the decline startet in 1983. I attended a set of Dexter at a concert bill and the first three tunes were performed without Dexter, who took his sweet time to get on stage and played with less power and less imagination only three other tunes. The post-Round Midnight concert tour of the "Round Midnite All Stars" remains a mistery for me. It was not recorded, I think it featured Bobby Hutherson. I had no occasion to see it, but I think it´s possible that Dexter again played only a few tunes.....

I didn´t know about this CD. I have the three performances as individual albums, the 1947 Bird and Diz, the 1949 "Chrismas Concert", and I think the 1954 stuff with the guys from MJQ was the last live recording of Bird. He sounds good, but maybe not at his peak. I have that Bellaphone LP "Jazz Tracks" and the last three tracks are those from 1954 "The Song is You", "My funny Valentine" and "Cool Blues". "My Funny Valentine" I think is the only occasion Bird played that tune.

I saw it several times. I saw it first when it was brandnew at the movies. The story is mostly based on Francis Paudras´ story about his time with Bud. That´s the same here, the friendship between Dale Turner (Dexter) and the young french Francis. About Dexter´s playing music in the film. Sure it is not as strong as he was before, but I think he had been very sick for 2 years and already had retired. I heard, that even after the film, Dexter played some gig´s with something like the "Round Midnight Allstars". They even went to Europe but I didn´t see it and have not heard recordings of it. This must have been shortly after the film. And it´s reported that Dexter played something with an Orchestra, and it was titled "Ellingtones". But it was not recorded I think......

Great, I love it.

Those two early Kenny Burrell albums for BN are wonderful. I heard Kenny Burrells guitar first on Paul Chamber´s "Whims of Chambers" and fell in love with it. 1956 must have been a wonderful year for Kenny Burrell, he recorded his first two albums for BN and played on others like for example Kenny Dorham´s live at Bohemia.

Terence Blanchard looks like a baby, I always had the impression he has a baby face. As much as I remember from their time with Blakey (I think I saw them with Art somewhere in the mid 80´s , Terence Blanchard played some very very fine, pretty trumpet, and Donald Harrison played very "abstract", sometimes quite atonal, a bit unusual for a band like the Messengers. Don´t misunderstand me, I am hip to free jazz and don´t need it only "smooth", but I remember Donald Harrison´s alto sounded strange in those surroundings.

How about "Bird at St. Nick´s" ? Though the solos of the other musicians were edited, this is Bird at his best. And he is wonderful on those ballads, which he didn´t play often "Smoke Get´s in Your Eyes", "What´s New", "I didn´t know what time it was"....... really wonderful

that´s true, but only bare legs somehow is a loss. Hosiery makes legs looking nicer. Yes, Frank Foster, when he was interviewed about his "Shiny Stockings" he stated that he alsways has been a "legs man".

Bonnie Wetzel, the only female bass star then. I think she also was on 52nd street. I think I saw here name on the bill of a club date there, in the Charlie Parker Memory Book "To Bird with Love".

I read somewhere that Bud, Elmo and Freddie Redd sometimes met Monk at his place and would play and listen to each other and discuss chords etc. I don´t know the swedish album. But from the other records of Freddie Redd I have not noticed much similarity to Elmo Hope. Elmo Hope somehow had a strange style. His right hand is very much in the high register, and the chords from the left hand are in the deep register. He plays very fast, but I think Bud had more melody in his lines. Hope sometimes sounds more dissonant, abstract.