jeffcrom

Enjoying the Hampel now. If you buy something from Clifford, be warned that's it's liable to be in better condition than he described. Darn him!

Knocky Parker/Omer Simeon Storyville Creepers (GHB)

Nathan Detroit Jimmy Cleveland Philly Joe Jones

Sabby Lewis - Boston Bounce (Phoenix). Six 1946 studio sides by Sabby's eight-piece Boston band, two 1944 New York airchecks by a full big band, and a 1944 jam session on side two. Paul Gonsalves, Big Nick Nicholas, Freddie Webster, and Ray Perry are on hand on various cuts, and there's a Tadd Dameron arrangement. JImmy Tyler is very impressive on alto sax. Hadn't spun this for awhile - nice stuff.

The Return of Jess Stacy (Hanover)

Frank's Place, episode 20, "Cultural Exchange," and episode 22, "The King of Wall Street." Brilliant television. Recorded on film rather than tape, so that even my DVD burn from 20-year-old videotapes look great. Episode 20, which concerns an East African musician who defects in New Orleans in order to play jazz, features Dizzy Gillespie with Harold Land, Walter Davis, Jr., Al McKibbon, and Tootie Heath.

George Lewis - At Dixieland Hall (Nobility). A really nice late (1965) George Lewis album. Louis Nelson is one of my favorite New Orleans trombonists, and the relatively modern Joshua Willis sounds very good - almost like a three-way cross between Bobby Hackett, Dizzy Gillespie, and Bunk Johnson. Lewis is not as strong as in his younger days, but is in fairly good form. I like it.

Artie Shaw and His Gramercy Five - Sequence in Music (Verve). With the orange and yellow label, as shown. This was apparently only used in Verve's 2000 series, which seemed to be designed to have wider pop appeal than their hard-core jazz issues. The orange label was later replaced by a blue one. In any case, this is an excellent album; Tal Farlow and Hank Jones on board.

Today's old country, starting with three from 1939 by Cap, Andy and Flip on their own Fireside Melodies label (manufactured for them by Gennett): Television in the Sky/McBeth Mine Explosion I'm Taking My Audition to Sing Up in the Sky/Lover's Message I'll Be Listening/Nobody Answered Me Cap, Andy and Flip were a popular West Virginia group in the 1930s and '40. Their Fireside Melodies records have never been reissued, as far as I can tell, except for "McBeth Mine Explosion," which recently showed up on a disaster songs anthology. While looking for a picture online, I saw that Audition/Lover's Message sold at auction this past February for $181. Buell Kazee - The Ship That's Sailing High/If You Love Your Mother (Brunswick, 1927) Fiddlin' Powers and Family - Ida Red/Old Joe Clark (Victor, 1924) Fiddlin' Powers and Family - The Little Old Cabin in the Lane/Sour Wood Mountain (Victor, 1924) Fiddlin' Powers was the real deal, and his family band was one of the first country string bands to record. I guess that Victor was worried about Powers' accent, though - they brought in the smoother country singer Carson Robison to do the vocals.

Doc Evans - Traditional Jazz (Audiophile). Ewing Nunn's Audiophile label produced some of the best-sounding records I've ever heard.

Charlie Poole with the Highlanders - The Complete Paramount & Brunswick Recordings, 1929 (Tompkins Square). Columbia wouldn't go along with Poole's desire to expand the North Carolina Ramblers by adding piano and a second fiddle, so he jumped ship and formed the Highlanders. Musically, these recordings justify his ideas; the larger band sounds magnificent. Commercially, Columbia was right - the Highlanders records didn't sell well.

Just did an internet search with smarter wording - the McCartt Brothers & Patterson record I have was apparently their only release. It was recorded at Columbia's Johnson City, Tennessee field session on October 18, 1928. And "Patterson" is Andy Patterson, the "Andy" of Cap, Andy & Flip. They recorded three fascinating 78s for their own Fireside Melodies label on November 9, 1939. I found all three of them in Chattanooga a couple of years ago. They're just weird enough to be very cool - one of the titles is "Television in the Sky." I'm glad to have made that connection. I need to play those Cap, Andy & Flip records tomorrow.

Julius Hemphill - Raw Materials and Residuals (Black Saint)

Well, I'm far from being an expert on early country music, but I enjoy it, especially in 78 RPM form. I come across "old-time" records in junk and antique shops fairly frequently during my 78-hunting trips around North Georgia - that's what people listened to around here. They're usually not in great shape, but that doesn't bother me that much. I found a Victor by Fiddlin' Powers and Family, one of the first Appalachian string bands to record, on Saturday - I haven't even cleaned and played it yet. Allen, let me know if you find out anything about the McCartt Brothers and Patterson.

Thanks for the info, Adrian. Old-time country today; I've probably mentioned some of these before. Many of these records are quite worn, but somehow that doesn't diminish my enjoyment; it's just part of the sound. Roy Harvey and the North Carolina Ramblers - The Brave Engineer/The Wreck of Virginian No. 3 (Columbia, 1926/27). Roy Harvey was the guitarist in Charlie Poole's Ramblers; here he fronts the band. West Virginia Night Owls - I'm Goin' to Walk on the Streets of Glory/Blind Alfred Reed - Fate of Chris Liveley and Wife (Victor, 1927). Reed was one of the Night Owls. Dock Walsh - The East Bound Train/I'm Free at Last (Columbia, 1925) Carolina Tar Heels - Love My Mountain Home/When the Good Lord Sets You Free (Victor, 1927). The Tar Heels were Dock Walsh and Gwen Foster. Holland Puckett - The Old Cottage Home/Little Bessie (Supertone, 1928) Scottdale String Band - Carolina Glide/My Own Iona (Okeh, 1927). Scottdale is down the road from me - a suburb of Atlanta that grew up around a cotton mill. The musicians here worked in the mill. McCartt Brothers & Patterson - Green Valley Waltz/Over the Sea Waltz (Columbia, 1928). This is the only group here about whom I can't find any information. It's a good record, though. Roy Hall and His Blue Ridge Entertainers - Natural Bridge Blues/Polecat Blues (Bluebird, 1941). Later than the other records, obviously, but very good - traditional string band music with an awareness of western swing.

Okay, here's the first semi-official confirmation I've found. Unfortunately, it appears to have been a murder-suicide, as I had heard. I was hoping that wasn't the case. I didn't know that Blailock had been living in the Houston area.

Not the best Sinatra album out there, but damn! Alec Wilder's "A Long Night," one of his last songs, really gets to me.

This drove me crazy, a little bit. I remembered reading about it, and thought I had recording of it somewhere. Well, not really. "Woods" was apparently a very late Ellington composition, and was nominally the penultimate piece on the 1973 Eastbourne Performance album. Except that piece is apparently not "Woods," no matter what the cover says. From the book of the massive Centennial Edition box set: With this reissue, an error is being corrected. The selection identified on the Eastbourne LP as "Woods" is not that piece. There is no known recording of "Woods," which [Art] Baron, Vince Prudente, Barrie Lee Hall and Harold Ashby all agree is a very pretty foxtrot for the saxophone section with Chuck Connors playing lead on bass trombone and an occasional solo by Paul Gonsalves. "It's mostly just a lovely ensemble piece that we played for dances," declares Prudente. The piece on Eastbourne Performance is actually "Soso," another example of the four-letter working titles that Ellington gave his pieces. "Soso" is very nice "rhythm changes" piece with some imaginative ensemble scoring, like the odd lengths of the trumpet notes in the last eight of the first chorus. After that first chorus it becomes a tenor battle between Harold Ashby and Percy Marion, and it's an enjoyable duel. (Paul Gonsalves was absent for health reasons, whatever that means.) So I can't really talk about "Woods," but there's a bit about the piece issued as "Woods." As it turns out, "Woods" was recorded in August, 1972, with a six-piece reed section: Russell Procope, Harold Minerve, Norris Turney, Harold Ashby, Paul Gonsalves, and Harry Carney. It was released on the MusicMasters/Jazz Heritage Society CD Never-Before-Released Recordings (1965-1972). It fits the description above, except that Ellington is the soloist, not Gonsalves. Stanley Dance's liner notes state that Woods "was written as a background to one of Duke Ellington's most popular songs, but he liked it so much that he often presented it as an instrumental in 1973." It sounds like it's based on the chord changes of "I've Got it Bad." It's faster than that ballad - a nice, danceable tempo. "Woods" is an attractive, simple little piece.

From a New Orleans musician Facebook friend: the highly respected New Orleans guitarist Steve Blailock has died. I don't know the details, but it looks like it might be a shooting death under strange circumstances. Steve Blailock is not a name that many people here are likely to know, but he was a talented guy - equally adept at traditional jazz, bebop, soul jazz, and R & B. Of the albums I know, perhaps the best showcase for his talent is Uncle Lionel Batiste's GHB album, available from Jazzology. He deserves a memorial thread here. I hope that the circumstances of his passing turn out to be more mundane than the first reports make it appear.

I've thought about having a variety of styli on hand for different records, but the logistics have deterred me. Do you have different cartridges and/or headshells? Or can you just change the stylus easily with your cartridge? I have separate stereo and mono cartridges/headshells for my LP rig, but the Miracord turntable I use for 78s had a non-standard headshell, and the connection system seems kind of delicate, so I don't want to be pulling it off and on with any regularity.

Brother Vernard Johnson - Father I Stretch My Hand to Thee (Glori)

Watched all the Sex House episodes again over the past couple of days - plus episode 10, a "reunion" show. The latter is kind of a cop-out, but the first nine episodes hold up well, and are recommended for those with strong stomachs. This YouTube-only show is funny, brilliant and horrifying.

Piano Red - First Piece of the Rock (Southern Tracks). Do you know this one, Magnificent Goldberg? I didn't know about it until I found a copy last week, and I'm from Atlanta. It's a local product, produced by the Lowery music publishing/recording group - Southern Tracks was their label - recorded in 1978 and issued in 1985. It alternates short interview tracks with raw, one-take quartet tracks. The group includes Wesley Jackson on guitar and Kid Miller on bass, both of whom were longtime Piano Red associates. It includes "Right String," of course, but otherwise the repertoire is not as predictable as on the average Piano Red release; there are even a couple of gospel songs. I'm really enjoying it.

Hoss Cartwright Dan Blocker Dan Dierdorf

In the picture above, Tom Brown is holding his Adolphe Sax-made soprano. (How cool is that?) He recorded on it only once - he plays alto on all the originally-issued Brown Brothers records. But an undated acetate dub of "Rosy Cheeks," featuring Tom on soprano, appears on the Archeophone Brown Brothers collection Those Moaning Saxophones. The origin of the recording is unknown, but it may have been dubbed from a now-lost Victor test pressing. I apologize for posting something serious in this thread, but I thought that was interesting. Oh, and Steve Lacy once said in an interview that the best sound he ever got was when he got to play an original Adolphe Sax horn at a museum.