Gheorghe

Yes, he´s doing well and I´m so glad about that. Other gigs in Vienna and Lower Austria will follow.....

oh ! Great musicians.....and Tony Reedus is one of my favourite drummers.

Mulgrew Miller was my favourite pianist in the 80´s. I saw him with Woody Shaw, and later with Blakey. And I think with Benny Golson-Curtis Fuller, when Griffin sat in for "In Walked Bud". With whom Mulgrew is playing here ?

I don´t know about much Parker playing Afro Cuban. He sit´s in with I think Machito somewhere and it is on a Spotlite LP, mostly with McGhee and Brew Moore. And he recorded that "Siesta" , a Verve album, which is not the best thing Bird did. You say, Woody Herman is on it. I think there was some "Bird with the Herd" , an old LP, but it was mostly straight ahead swing, only one number I think was titled "Cuban Holiday", a quite simplified imitation of Cuban influences in the theme, but the solos is in straight fours..... Is this something that never appeared on record ?

This one is of course a favourite of mine, not only for the music (fantastic !) but also for historical reasons. We jazz lover kids back then in the early 70´s just had the brandnew "Bitches Brew" and that forrunner LP was not so much known, but someone had it and if one of us had pocketmoney and would hurry to the record dealer and buy it. One funny thing : We didn´t know how to pronounce the title and asked each other "Hast Du schon die Fil-les de Killi-Mann-Tscháro ? No one of us knew what it means until I heard about that mountain in Africa and thought it means "Vieles vom Kilimanjaro" (something like "many (musical impressions) from Kilimanjaro. We all hummed that bass intro ......, we were crazy about bass lines. That bass line on "Miles Runs the Voodoo down", and that ostinato bass line on I think Side 2 of "In a Silent Way".

Hello friends, We are going to play some concerts with the wonderful alto saxophonist Allan Praskin, who started his career in the States, where he first recorded for the legendary ESP label (James Zitro), played with greats like Bobby Hutcherson, Harold Land, George Morrow and later came to Europe with Gunther Hampel´s "Galaxy of Dreams". We are playing on Thursday March 9th at the wonderful jazzclub "Zwe" here in Vienna. jazz, zwe, event - Jazzclub ZWE and in the Easterweek, thursday April 6th at "Porgy and Bess" Allan Praskin Quintet (USA/A) at Porgy & Bess - Jazz & Music Club

Oh, I have not heard about that series. From Hamburg the only thing I know is all them records from Onkel Pö´s Carnegie Hall. I had heard about the Fabrica too. That would be nice to hear all those treasures of all them genius musicians who played then in the old days, when we saw them performing on stage. The Pharoah Sanders Quartets had quite a common program. "Dr. Pitt" was almost on each concert, same like "Masterplan", and always a very very nice old ballad. I don´t remember what repertory I heard him play about that time besides those tunes: I think it always was some beautiful old ballad, and sometimes an old bebop tune too. I heard him do "On a Misty Night" and some Parker Blues, it may have been "Au Private" or something like that.

Yes, I had one more decade of pre-internet. All that kind of managing to get thru who it was in the 70´s, 80, and the beginning of the 90´s , I mean to call guys to fix a gig, to have to be everywhere for checking the scene: Who´s playin´, whom can I use, who could use me, where is a new venue to play. It was mostly mouth to mouth propaganda, but anyway we jazz musicians and jazz fans were like a family. Oh, and private live then. To date a girl.....and if she was late or changed her mind......

He is also sittin in with the Coltrane sextet in Seattle playing "Love Supreme Live". And didn´t he work with Miles Davis also, somewhere in the first half of the 70´s (when I saw Miles, he had Dave Liebman).

I love all those "Uncle Pö" series and have a lot of them. This is the Woody Shaw band I heard live in 1983. The best band I think. I also have an older Woody Shaw from Onkel Pö and he is also on a Louis Hayes-Junior Cook. I mostly listen to live recordings, since on those an can hear the drums better than on most of the studio records.

Did you see the 70th Birthday Blakey concert with all the older members sittin in ? At Leverkusen ?

Is it possible that he was not so well known in European countries, or was he more popular for a certain community of fans than among musicians ? During my jazz education it seems that he was not mentioned, and I didn´t see his records in the collections of fellow musicians/jazz-lovers. I have not heard about the mentioned other members of that trio, not the bass player, not the drummer. I think I saw him on a festival schedule in Austria in the 80´s and until then I didn´t even know him. As much as I try to remember it was quite nice chamber music jazz, a bit of latin touch, I don´t know who was the personnel, but I remember an electric bass player who played a bass with two necks, and got the most solo space. Lewis´ statements where shorter inputs, but I think the crowd was spending very very much applause to that electric bass player.

incredible. Yes I remember, on that old Savoy disc "Fats-Kenny-Bud-Klook" I heard that fine baritone and wondered who he is and why he didn´t record further with bop stars, let´s say with Diz, with Tadd, with all of them..... It seems there were musicians you once heard on a record, like "Leonard Hawkins" on that old Savoy disc "Dexter Rides Again" , and wonder what happened to them.....

I had on several occasions dreams that I am on stage and have hand gloves so my articulation is not clear and while playing I try to take them gloves off but don´t succeed. Or I dream that there´s something funny with the keys, like if there is a blanket over them and I try to finger out my stuff but it doesn´t come off.... And long ago I dreamt I got a call that I have to make a one nighter with Al DiMeola and it was during the time of RTF. Well the music I was used to play might be acoustic jazz, and I wondered what will be the set list and if I know the tunes or at least can jump on it by listening.... During the time I played with an electric jazz/funk-jazz group sometimes the stuff I actually composed came out of a dream. So I think all the jazz dreams have been and will be about me involved in music.....

I just saw there is an Al McKibbon discography too. I had not known that Al McKibbon recorded under his own name. That´s really a rarety among the classic jazz bassists of the 40´s (Mc Kibbon, Tommy Potter, Curley Russel and Gene Ramey I think were the most recorded bassists then. I only once found to my astonishment a disc of Tommy Potter under his own name (hard funk in sweden). They all were strong bassists, better known for their sidemen roles than for own soloing. McKibbon had a strong tone and can be heard very very well on the Dizzy Gillespie Big Band, I think he also recorded "One Bass Hit" as a solo feature with the band. I also like his strong, boppish sound on "Giants of Jazz" and his solo on Tin Tin Deo (I think it´s only a Dizzy-McKibbon duet).

I never saw so many Sonny Stitt recordings. I must admit my Stitt-discography is quite scarce. I heard him very very early when the record dealer recommended it to me since it has Bud on it and as all Bud records I like those most who have a horn player added. The Verve Years was not necessary what impressed me most. I think I heard one "Stitt for Starters" once at a friends place and he was delighted when I recognized Freddie Green on guitar. He had the record but had not read who is on it and when I said "Freddie Green is playiing" he looked at the personnel and said "f.... yeah !" The only time I saw Stitt live was in 1980 and I had caught a bad night. I witnessed a very ridiculous thing, about the way I had read only in "scandal story books of jazz" like some bizarre stories about Bird or Bud when they were completly stoned or drunk.....hard to listen to and hard to look at..... Shepp at Massy I have. I think I bought it in a small bus at some jazz festival where they sold records... I still have not understood what it is with Bird playing Afro Cuban. I have the quite weak "Fiesta" on Verve and I have some air shots of Bird with Machito on a Spotlite LP, and there is some little compositions like "Barbados" which is latin influenced but gets into swing as early as the solos start..... So what´s that unissued concert of Bird playing Latin only ?

One of my favourites especially for all his outputs of the 60´s, first as Miles´ saxophonist, and then as a leader. Fantastic. I didn´t hear much Shorter in "Weather Report" but might re-listen to it eventually. I had all his great compositions in mind when I saw him again in the early 2000´s but for me it was a bit harder to listen, it sounded a bit more like ECM-like music... I don´t remember I heard him talkin live , he was introduced by Joe Zawinul even after he had left Weather Report.... He can be heard commenting his time with Miles on some Miles documentary film, but he is not such a rhetoric speaker as were others. And the introduction of the book about him, where it starts with a conversation between him and the author it´s quite hard to understand it.... I´ll always love his music.

Very interesting story. Geoff Keezer I think was one of the pianists of Art Blakey´s Jazz Messengers. I think I heard on album, it may have been Art´s 70´s Birthday and Keezer sounds very fine. "Scene is Clean" is an album dedicated to Dameron - tunes ?

I must admit I paid attention only to the musicians I know and saw live, (Cobham. Clarke, Deron Jackson). I had not heard about Larry Carlton I think, and sure I have not heard about one "Najee" and sure no "smooth jazz". Thought it´s a solid jazz-rock formation. I must admit that I liked Mulgrew Miller much more as a pianist and Tony Reedus more than Victor Lewis. Steve Turré was in the Woody Shaw quintet I saw, and Stafford James was the bassist. That was one of the hottest bands. From the first half of the 70´s I was listening to all Miles I could find, the first quintet , the second quintet and the then current electric band of 1973, and did spread my knowledge thru buying the records of the so called "sidemen" also. Schizofrenia was my first Wayne Shorter album and I loved it and still love it, the first tune is a really catching tune, the fast "Schizofrenia" is similar to the stuff on "All Seeing Eye" and there´s a beautiful ballad on it as well. A wonderful album. I bought this quite late, I think in the early 2000´s when it came out on RVG. After "Schizofrenia" this is about the most exiting, best thing I heard. So much energy, it´s fantastic and the soloists are fantastic, one of my favourite albums of the 60´s. I like Schizofrenia and All Seeing Eye much more than "Adams Apple". This record was easy to purchase in the 70´s when most 60´s Mingus albums were available on the french "America" label. I was a constant buyer of "America" LPs since they were easy to purchase in Europe and were cheaper than let´s say CBS, BN or Impulse! . I bought this one after the great Paris Concert. From the original Mingus band only Cliff Jordan and Danny Richmond were left, so it was cut down to a quartet. I had never heard the name Jane Getz and had thought she might be the wife of Stan Getz. The music is fantastic. It´s even more "far out" than the version of Fables of Faubus from the Paris concert. Here it is titled "New Fables" I think. The then available America Albums of Mingus, besides the "Great Concert" and "Right Now" were "Mingus at Monterey" (then I thought "Monterey" is the English name for "Montreux" 😄) , "My Favourite Quintet", then the two old albums "Mingus Quintet with Max Roach", and "Chazz", as well as the then brand new 1970´s albums "Pyticantropus Erecturs" and "Blue Bird"......

Two heroes of my youth (Stanley Clarke and Billy Cobham, and the last keyboardist of Miles. Must sound good.

Yeh, lukewarm reviews. The worst thing I ever heard was a LD record on BN from around 1974 with that mixture of studio band playing backbeat stuff. I had bought it since I had thought it is a newer album, but after one listening I literally threw it into the garbage can. The "Blues Walk" and the Japanese interest: YEAH. I had heard they had some tea houses were they did spin jazz records, and Japanese folks were crazy about BN stuff and hard bop, and "Blues Walk" as well as "Cool Struttin" were big hits over there. The last time I saw Lou live he had a Japanese Girl on organ, she was fine, and a Japanese drummer. But it was very simple drum style, the way it´s on more than one BN records with organ.....,

I missed that, I think when this came out the only Lou Donaldson on record I knew was from his session with Monk. He seemed to be quite a "forgottten Man" until the end of the 70´s . I heard him at least 3 or 4 times, two of them with Herman Foster on piano. He is great with them heavy block chords, but that´s all, he does it great, but that means that almost each tune get´s into that direction. That´s why I like the "Lou Take´s Off" with Sonny Clark much more than all the stuff with Herman Foster. I would have liked to hear him with another pianist in the 70´s or 80´s , maybe Cedar Walton or Kenny Drew... But I still remember the first time I saw him on a festival , he played "Cheek to Cheek" in a very fast tempo. I love that and I love to play it too. But I saw only a shorter part of the set, because like those huge festivals are: At the same time in 3 different halls there was Jackie McLean, Lou Donaldson, Pharoah Sanders, and I had to hurry to catch something from each one, I think I spent most of the time listening to the Jackie McLean group, little time (just that tune) Lou, and still enough time to hear some very fine Pharoah....

So I´m not alone with my impression. I had that "problem" with allround studio bands quite often. I don´t like the Big Band on Charlie Parker on Verve "Temptation", it sounds more like movie music from some typical 1950´s films. I have my thing with Big Bands: I love the Eckstine Band from the 40´s , the Dizzy Big Band , the Thad Jones - Mel Lewis, the Sun Ra Archestra, that´s some big band sounds that really thrills me.

I think I have that early Art Blakey. Is it possible that there is a strange version of "Tin Tin Deo" on it, with vocal and it sounds similar to the "Tin Tin Deo" we musicians play, but is more "traditional". The Ammons/Stitt combined with what I´d name an ultimate "dream band" (Cedar Walton, Sam Jones, Billy Higgins). I think they also recorded as an own unit and named themself "Magic Triangle" . Fantastic Rhythm section, I have the live sessions with Cliff Jordan, and I think "Eastern Rebellion" was the same, but with another Hornplayer. And they recorded on Jackie McLeans last studio album "Nature Boy", but with another bass player, I think Sam Jones had died....

I have lost traces, I was a subscriber when I was very young and DB was my main info who is playin in the wonderful NY, the dream of us jazz playing teenagers.....