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Sure we shouldn´t try to write Joe Albany off for his weak and unsure playing at the Finale with Bird and Miles. He was not alone. With the exception of Bud and sure Hank Jones and some others, many many piano players at the beginning may have been fascinated with bop and what they heard Bird ´n Diz play but couldn´t transpond it to piano, that´s why they sounded "stiff" . Al Haig at Town Hall and at Billy Berg´s in 1945 is no exception , Sadik Hakim or his original name Argonne Thornton sounds strange on the Savoy sides with Bird, melodically and rhytmically "stiff", Duke Jordan also had his problems in the early days. Lou Levy was good ! I wish you succes for what you want to get from some of Joe Albany´s style, and if you know records from him from the 60´s where he swings hard, this will be the best way to get into his stuff. And hope you got guys to play with who also dig that stuff. Maybe after some repetitions you can do a gig of a kind of "Albany Memorial" or so, if you find an audience who has heard about him, I wish you luck since I assume you a musician, as this is the musician´s forum . I didn´t know the record you mention and must apologize: In my case there is so little time to listen to records, I got to play and the few times I listen to records it´s mostly to check out a tune if I don´t know it exactly so I have the line and the chords in my memory . That´s why I listened to a Blue Mitchell album 2 days ago which has "Chick´s tune". It´s based on the chords of "You Stepped out of a dream" . Anyway I know the chords, it´s easy cheesy , but you got to know Chick´s line on it, that pedal point section and so..... , so you have to know the stuff to support the horns properly and be "hand in glove" with the drummer and bassist..... I hesitated to buy the book since I´m quite thru with books about musician tragedies. I saw too many fellow musicians die to bear that kind of stuff. Musicians, great musicians I played with and whom I miss. But eventually I bought that DVD, since my wife once watched with me "Round Midnite" for several times, and Eastwood´s "Bird" (not as good), and I thought the story daughter and difficult father might go, but first I looked at it alone to be sure how it is, and for me it was bull....., maybe that´s why I also didn´t buy the film about the life of Miles, since I heard it´s also more about the drug stuff........, I´m not a moralist and if someone does that stuff it´s his business, but I don´t want to read about a musician for anything else than his music .......

I became aware of Chet Baker as late as 1978 when there was a long interview with him at "Jazz Podium". It seems that his name was not quite mentioned until then by the kind of gang or fellow musicians I had, or the a bit older mentors. It is possible, that his early stuff was better known by listeners of a kind of softer way of jazz. The strange thing he stated in that interview was that "he came to Europe with Methadone and took it , then less and less until he didn´t need it anymore". But this cannot be true, because Chet was a bad junkie until the end. But one thing: He started to appear at festivals and us, who hadn´t heard about him before, liked it very much. Anyway what he did in his last 10 years was what we wanted to hear and it had very little in common with what was recorded in the 50´s . I like it very much. And Charlie Rouse here, fantastic, and it could be anything, it still sounded "Monkish", wonderful. Once I spinned it and a young girl said she likes it very much, which was astonishing since otherwise she didn´t dig jazz. Yeah, it has something, but it seemed it didn´t sell well when it came out, since I didn´t see another BN record with Rouse as a leader.

Wasn´t Ben Webster seen and heard on "Quiet Days in Clichy" ? I remember well when that film was in cinema here, and an elder couple were watching it and she always had to ask him, what´s happenin which he explained. At one point she asked him "what´s that now ?" And he answerd "She pissed into the bathtub" and she just said "oh yes.... I see" 😄

I can´t offer educational resources since I´m mostly self taught , but what I observed from the few listening experiences is that at the session with Bird , Joe Albany still couldn´t swing and tried somehow to copy what he thought is bebop, Later he got a more chromatic or "atonal" or "12 tone" thing into it. Maybe like Dick Twardzik from Boston did, at least from the few stuff I heard from him. So the best thing would be to listen to some of his works and if it is what you like, get a bit "into that thing" and with those impressions you got from it, to bring it into your own playing. Big Ears is always the best start to get into a style, and most of all, find fellow musicians who would dig that thing also.....

I almost "grew up listening to him" since he was a Viena-Resident and lived here (or better said: stopped here for rest between tours all over the world) . Naturally, at least 2 , 3 times each year he played some days of gig at Jazzland. The first time I heard him, long long ago the first tune he played was Parker´s "Red Cross", that rhythm changes tune in Bb. I remember two "stories" in context with Farmer: Since he was famous, fellow musicians from the States, who did a concert in Viena, would like to meet him, and so Max Roach came into the club to see Art Farmer playing, it was in 1978. We all hoped that Roach would sit in, but he did not (maybe contractual reasons). The next day Roach played a big concert and Art was there and Roach greated him from the stage. Shortly before Art died, I don´t know if he still could play, he came to see James Moody who was sheduled. I think this was 20 years later. Art was happy and they talked very much together, but Art looked very old and sick, though James Moody who was even some years older, looked much younger, Art Farmer died a few weeks after that I think. And one year later my wife and me met James Moody in Miami and we talked about Art Farmer.....

It didn´t happen often this year that I posted what I listened to, since the most listening was live, but since some of my best music colleages and I dare to say almost friends played "Chick´s Tune" I must say I loved that line and anyway the song structure and form is easy since it´s based on "You Stepped Out of a Dream". I had asked them during intermission what it was and they told me the name of the tune, so I googled and found it on that Blue Mitchell album. I somehow reminded I had bought this once with some batch of RVG´s without paying much attention, so I revisited it and oh yeah, wonderful: The first tune is some party mood, very danceable stuff on rhythm changes in F . There also is a slow blues composed by Joe Henderson, who didn´t play on that session. The musicians just great. I don´t remember I had heard Blue Mitchell else than in the context with Horace Silver. Junior Cook sure was underrated, he really can play and never disappointed me. The bass player is a bit subdued..... Chick Corea is superb here. Sometimes he got shades of Monk in his solos, sometimes you hear a bit of Bud, but you also hear lines that later developed to what he started with Miles . Such a great musician. And my all time favourite Al Foster, I love him, I love everything he did. A fanstastic drummer. And then "Chick´s Tune" the reason why I listened to this record. I have it in my head all the time, anyway I love to improvise on "You Stepped out of a Dream" it´s tricky changes but it flows so easily....

Peter King was a great player and I´m sure I would have preferred to listen to him than to a Tony Scott leaping on stage and damaging the show to make his own show..... About not recognising him: I first read his name and saw his picture in a book of interviews "Jazz Podium" , interviews with let´s say Rollins, Dexter, Max Roach, Elvin Jones, Ornette Coleman and so on and one "Tony Scott" I never had heard about before. He had a bald head and an enormous beard, I don´t remember what he said or what he was asked. See, my knowledge of jazz and jazzmusicians mostly came from fellow musicians who were a bit older than me and pulled my coat to the artists I should listen to and learn from, let´s say Rollins , Roach, Mingus, Bird of course, Ornette, Herbie Hancock etc. ..... just to become a good musician, and I doubt someone said "get some Tony Scott records to learn about jazz...." so I didn´t have records with him, and of course not from the 50´s . I may have had one clarinet record and this maybe was the Goodman Carnegie Hall since they said "look, that´s the swing style, dig some stuff from that, it´s the style before bebop started.....". That´s how I collected records....

It seems that Ljubljana during that time had good festivals. Well 1957 was two years before I was born, but even in the 70´s it was a nice place with still some kind of former Austrian K&K flair, that´s how I remember it. A lot of US-Stars played there.

I would have liked to read the complete review of the Ronny Scott gig, but for this I might "log in or subscribe". It would have been interesting for me because I heard Dexter quite often in that period. I also remember the over long Eddie Gladden solos. Though I am a drums fan and love to listen to or to play with top drummers, 20 Minute drum solos especially by Gladden is not really constructive for a set of music. It usually was on the last tune "Backstairs" a simple blues in Bb at fast tempo. And yeah, Dexter would disappear, but I think this was due to his ever increasing consumption of booze. I doubt he went backstairs to have "a bite to eat", he might have emptied a bottle. And yeah, I think it is not fine to leave the stage when fellow musicians play their solo. I love to hear every bit of the drum solo, if I have a gig. Maybe someone can post the whole review ?

Very interesting to read. I must admit two things: The clarinet never was my dream instrument, somehow it does not really appeal to me, well I heard some Buddy de Franco I really liked, I think it was "Deep Night" with Art Tatum. The few clarinet solos on some bop-broadcasts with John LaPorta are funny, but again I think the sound of the clarinet is not really "my thing". About the attitude of Tony Scott: Well I have read more about what he said about let´s say Bird or Lady Day (in the Robert Reisner book, and about in the Billy Holiday book), than I would have heard . I think his clarinet can be heard on some of those Bird discoveries that appeared on some CDs in the 90´s or early 2000´s, but I am not so aware of it now. The kind of persons who jump on the stage on jam sessions more for egotism than for sharing is not a seldom thing. Also the story telling thing of lesser prominent musicians or would like to be musicians, who brag that they "sat on the same table with Ornette Coleman or with Elvin Jones, they will appear anywere. Here in Vienna we call those sort of guys "Adabei" (the Viennese dialect word for "auch dabei"). I can´t say nothing about an Asia Period and asian meditation music, because this never was my bag. I get something of world music influences in some of Don Cherry´s "Codona I-III" and so on, of course in some Trane and even more by his followers, even by Miles in his 1972 bands with sitar and tablas and so on, but this is not really meditation music so I can dig some of it.

Yeah that´s the one. Interesting that it is also titled "Memorial Album". I think I bought the Prestige mostly for the Side B with the Dameron organisation, the legendary "Atlantic City Band". I think those tunes were lesser known, at least from the musicians point of view. We would do quite a few Dameron compositions like Hot House, Good Bait, Our Delight, If you could see me know and so on, I mean the tunes that are performed in general until knowadays, but the tunes from the here mentioned sessions I think I only had heard by Philly J.J.´ "Dameronia"-Band.

From all the more traditional recordings McLean made before "One Step Beyond" this is my favourite. Nowadays I rarely listen to the dozens of Prestige sessions he did but this one is my idea of a perfectly done Standardtunes-Album with a perfect rhythm-section. And dig "Let´s face the music and dance", that´s a very very old tune I think from the late 20´s or early 30´s but very interesting chords. It´s interesting that Walter Bishop, who was quite obscure after the time with Bird, did some sessions around 1960 as a sideman for BN, the others I think was the "Cappuccino-Swing" that @BillF mentioned, and the wonderful Dizzy Reece album. And Jimmy Garrison on bass was also was a quite rare guest on BN. If I remember right, there was also a Clifford Brown "Memorial Album" on Prestige. This one is very fine and I think it was done before Brownie became really famous. Is this the one with Lou Donaldson on as ? The lineup for the Blakey live date at Birdland ? Anyway, I have it somewhere, I think it is one of Brownies earlier records before the Roach-Brown Unit. Oh yeah. It is interesting, that all sidemen of Miles Davis´ so called "Second Quintet" recorded for BN. This one is astonishing for a just 18 year old boy. He must have been very very adult for his age to make such a highly intellectual album. Wonderful music. It shows another side of Tony , the composer side. Anyway, Tony always has been one of my favourite drummers. oh fine, a lot of old BN stuff around here now. Maybe this one was the best showcase for Mr.Chambers, though maybe lesser known than "Whims of Chambers". I had "Whims" mostly for Trane and Philly J.J. and I think I saw this "Quintet" only as a BN-Conn. The third album without horns is the most obscure one. I don´t think it sold that well.

It´s a must for bop lovers. Diz and Bird in top form and during the time they really worked together. The later Bird´n Diz reunion on Verve was a slight disappointment, it didn´t have the fire of this live date, even with Monk on piano. But I also observed, that Al Haig on this date still was a beginner, he became an excellent bop pianist from 1948 on, as the "Bird at Roost" sessions and the recording sessions with Wardell Gray and Fats Navarro proove, but in 1945 he still sounded very "stiff". But this is a natural developement. When I started, it sounded similar, it took some years to get the feeling to make things "flow in a natural manner" like it does when Diz and Bird play or Bud did play..... I once saw that cover, it might be possible I have that session since my wife once bought me a Mingus CD called "Newport Rebels" and I was astonished that besides some tracks featuring old masters like Eldrige and Jo Jones, it also had more stuff like a pianoless quintet with Dolphy and so on. I must listen to it again when the quiet winter days will come and I can find time to listen to records else then just checking out things.....

I don´t remember if I have this. From the BN albums that have Hutch, McCoy, Herbie Lewis together the one I have is "Time for Tyner" but it has Freddie Waits on drums and not Billy , and the one of McCoy with Joe Henderson I think is "The Real McCoy. Is this an originally rejected session. The only previously unreleased Hutch I have is one that was recorded with the same personnel like "Idle Moments" , but it does not really surprise me. Good for easy listening, but with a too tame rhytm section. Oh yeah, I think nowadays it is hard to find. Actually this was my first Jazz Messengers album when I was a teenager. Then it was on a RCA black&white series LP, same photo but a black cover. When I met Bill Hardman in person, I told him that this album was the first time I heard his trumpet and Mr. Hardman said yes he remembers that session very well. I think this was a lesser known edition of the Messengers, if I remember right they also did an album with Monk replacing the piano player.

@Pim and @clifford_thornton: I don´t exactly know how it´s called , I think my later father once said he is an "agnostic". I never heard my parents talk about God or religion so I didn´t grow up with anything like that, but my father who only listened to classical music also was very moved if he heard some Bach or Handel or Bruckner, who wrote compositions dedicated to Got or Jesus Christ whatever.... So maybe we fell the same if we listen to some of the later Coltrane or Pharoah Sanders or Alice Coltrane works, it moves me. I once spinned Pharoahs "Healing Song" for my then 90+ years old mother who also did not have that church thing and she loved it. She loved Coleman´s "Loneley Woman", Mingus´ "Meditations on Integration" and Pharoah´s Healing song.

I love what Gary Bartz does , maybe less those ethno jazz albums or what you call it, but maybe the latest Bartz I heard was on Heads of States, two albums. He sounds great on that. It´s quite astonishing how much his face reminds me of Sonny Rollins.

I have it on an USB Stick of about 30 LPs, that I have in my car. I always have it runnin from the beginning to the end and at one point I said it´s not really enjoyable, especially in the car. Kelly never disappointed me , you know what you will hear, it´s a lighter approach, like the way he plays "If you could see me now" on Smokin´ at the Half Note, a very fine album. Well I don´t think I have or had albums under his own name, the Smokin´ I bought because of Wes. But also the "Full House" also from the 60´s is very fine. On the other hand, though Paul Chambers was the ideal bassist for Kelly when Kelly left Miles and formed his own unit, but somehow Paul Chamber´s career got down a bit. I think he was the most recorded bassist in the late 50´s early 60´s but became less involved as a recording artist .

It took me more than 30 years to hear about the venue Rockland Palace. The music from that date was known over here as the album "Bird is Free", which had on the cover a blue sky and a white Bird. That was the early 70´s and there were many free jazz freaks around hear, but Bird kinda was their "James Dean". And many people bought "Bird is Free" because of the title with the word "Free". Maybe the bad recording quality, the somehow not always clear sound, the wowering piano, but most of all that incredible improvisations on the fast "Lester Leaps In" fascinated us. First shocked by the bad sound quality we all got back listening to that LP over and over again. I think it was two albums of that kind that we had , the "Free" and then "The Happy Bird" about the same time beginning of the 50´s , but better sound quality. Well time flies. When we listened to this stuff, that music was only 20 years old , and Bud had died only a few years earlier. Incredible. Sure I didn´t have the album any more, and my wife bought me the Rockland Stuff a few years ago as a CD with even more unissued material. I remember she liked "My Little Suede Shoes" . I remembered also "Sly Moongoose" from the original "Bird is Free". I had to laugh when I remembered that in the time I first heard it and saw the title, I still didn´t speak English other than from what I thought is English or from the old dictionary, slowly creepin´into the materie through reading liner notes. I had thought that "Moongoose" is the English word for Mogole, I mean for a man from Mongolia. So I thought it´s about a sly guy from Mongolia 😄

Sorry maybe a stupid question, but : Why are we all "newbies" ? We were groovers, veteran groovers, masters of the groove, groovissimi and so on ? Not that I need such a thing, but "newbie" for us guys who post almost every day ?

I love it, one of my favourite Joe Henderson albums. It was recorded in 1978 when I saw him here in Viena for the first time but don´t remember who was with him. I also saw him in 1979 and can´t recall who was with him. Here it is two top notch all star quartets featuring Chick Corea, Tony Williams, great !

I think Wynton Kelly was a model for generations of pianists. When I listen to the playing of a great austrian pianist and composer, I often hear some Wynton Kelly stuff or touch in it. And my late mentor Fritz Pauer also told me once "listening to Wynton Kelly, very "healthy" ". About the date with Paul Chambers as a leader, I think I had this on a double LP with two different sessions: One might have been with Cannonball and had "There is no greater love" on it, and the other is with Yusuf Lateef on it. It was on a strange obscure label named "Trip Records", and the Side 4 could not be listened to, it wowered . I also had an Eric Dolphy LP from the same label "Trip Records" with Jitterbug Waltz on it. I also have a Wynton Kelly - George Coleman from Baltimore, not with the usual Paul Chambers but with the also fine Ron McLure, but it is so bad recording quality, it´s too much treble, you don´t hear the bass strong enough and from the drums you only hear the cymbals.....

Well Coltrane was one of the most creative geniuses of the 20th Century. I have heard that his was fascinated in diferent religions. Like his follower Pharoah Sanders too, who got his own. I love to hear their works like "Love Supreme" and "The Creator has a Master Plan" and so on, and one thing that prooves their charisma is the fact that I´m a completley non-religious person, not an atheist, there can be something, but not bound to any church. And nevertheless I hear some religious message in those art works..... About math. and physics, I heard that quite a lot of musicians excelled in those materies in high school (Monk, Miles maybe, ).

Well Mobley said in 1973 that besides Trane and Rollins he was the only one who could play right for Monk and says "he is not braggin´". But.......as much as I love Mobley and he is one of my favourite, I never think about his sound and phrasing as fitting for Monk. Griffin was very fine with Monk, and my favourite tenor saxophonist for Monk will ever be Charlie Rouse. I would have liked to hear a recording where Pat Patrick played with Monk for a short period. I also heard some late Monk with Paul Jeffrey, but somehow I don´t like that so much, Jeffrey has a quite overwhelming sound and seems to repeat a lot of phrases but it doesn´t come off as well as it was with Rouse. Same with Dexter Gordon: I like a lot of his music, especially "Manhattan Symphony", but that only rendition of "Ruby My Dear" on "Great Encounters" (a leftover from the "Manhattan Symphony" date, I don´t like it. Ruby My Dear or Midnight , the two Monk things I heard played by Dexter are disappointing for me. Well he did "Rhythm a ning" but you must not feel Monk to play that. Any player who plays on rhythm changes at a faster tempo could do that, a super fast Griffin as well as a laid back Dexter......

I heard only the improvised chorusses. But anyway, there are so many "rhythm-tunes", most of them in Bflat. If players call "rhythm changes tune in B flat" , I´d play what they suggest. Many dudes want "Anthropology" since it seems it´s part of Jazz-School repertory, some or even more dudes want "Oleo", some want it with lesser notes like "Lester Leaps In" or "Second Balcony Jump". I like "Shaw Nuff" for the intro it has...., or Rhythm Changes in other keys like E-flat, A flat or D-flat, F or C, and some have the rhythm changes in the A parts and other chords in the brigde.

You sound so great, Michael ! And Lou back then. I like that stuff much more than the later organ featured quartets. I´m sure that rhythm-changes tune might be "Wee" though you don´t hear the theme that was standard program of Lou. That´s first rate be-bop, your piano, Lou´s alto..... Thank´s for sharing.