jeffcrom

Steve Lacy - Capers (Hat Hut). Unavailable in full on CD - the reissue has four and a half of the eight tracks of this double LP.

James Blood Ulmer - Part Time (Rough Trade). The 1983 Montreux performance by my favorite Ulmer band, the Odyssey trio with Charles Burnham and Warren Benbow. Not as good as Odyssey, but engagingly muddy, raw, and intense.

Female Blues Singers - Volume B3 (Fantasy by Selmerphone). A valuable LP, on the predecessor to the Document label. Here are the complete known recordings of Marie Bradley, Evelyn Brickey, Florence Bristol, Ada Brown, Ardell "Shelly" Bragg, and Alberta Brown. Bradley, Bragg, and Alberta Brown are very good. I bought this album at the Louisiana Music Factory years ago after hearing one of the two Alberta Brown tracks on WWOZ. Her only released 78 was recorded in New Orleans in 1928, with a great quartet (trumpet, clarinet, piano, tuba) accompanying. The instrumentalists are often given as members of the Halfway House Orchestra, who recorded for Columbia the day before, but I think it's four of Johnny Miller's New Orleans Frolickers, who recorded the same day, only a few matrices later. That would make them Sharkey Bonano, Siidney Arodin, Johnny Miller, and Chink Martin. In any case, her voice is strong, if a little on the hard side. Texas singer Ardell Bragg's voice was limited, but loose and flexible. The most interesting of her eight tracks is "Bird Nest Blues," the tune Charley Patton was trying to copy with his "Bird Nest Bound." He misunderstood Bragg's lyrics - Bragg's song is more coherent, but Patton's is more poetic. I couldn't find a picture of this album online.

Whitey Mitchell Sextette (ABC Paramount). Some very different Steve Lacy here; he was only 21 years, but already the most interesting and accomplished soloist here.

Spinning tonight - and as I suspected, I'm finding more to enjoy than in the past. It's still in the bottom ten per cent of Lacy's output, as far as quality goes, and it certainly makes a better case for Lacy's flexibility and musicality than for Armstrong's. It's two musicians taking parallel paths that never quite intersect, although Lacy takes more steps toward Armstrong's world than Armstrong does toward Lacy's. I agree about the blues content of much of what Armstrong plays - that the aspect of his playing I enjoy the most. It looks like Armstrong lived and taught in Bellingham, Washington, where some of my wife's family lives, and where I'll probably end up when she retires. I'll be there in a few days, in fact. I'm glad I listened to this tonight, although it will probably be a few more years before I spin it again.

That's funny - I've always liked that one. I think I've said around here somewhere that I think Michael played Lacy's compositions - as compositions - better than any other pianist. Which, of course, is not the same as saying that he was the best pianist to play with Lacy.

Stockhausen - Trans; Southwest German Radio Orchestra / Ernest Bour

Had a negative reaction to that one and haven't played it in years; I sometimes even cite this as the only Steve Lacy album I don't like. But that's not really fair, because like I say, it's been years since I've heard it. I need to pull it off the shelves and give it a spin soon. I suspect it's a lot better than I remember.

I haven't listened to Keith Emerson for many years, but as a teenager I was an ELP fan, and an Atlanta Emerson, Lake & Palmer show was the first big rock concert I attended, in 10th grade or so. RIP.

I thought I answered this question in my earlier post, but I guess I wasn't clear. From your end, the mechanical license covers the royalties you owe, based on how many units you are manufacturing and how long your rendition is. You pay it and you're done, unless you press more copies. Any further royalties to the publisher would come from airplay, use in a soundtrack, etc., not from you.

I had a similar situation - a small-run CD that was all original material except for one Steve Lacy tune. I didn't go through Harry Fox - I did internet research to find the publisher. I actually didn't contact the right publisher; I found Lacy's European publisher, who kindly directed me to the firm who handled the rights for North America. For 300 copies, it cost me something like thirty bucks. And that was it for that 300 copies - no further payments needed. But yes, if you press more copies, you'll need to fork over more money. The publisher did all the math to come up with that figure. I would try to contact Mraeros Music directly. If you can't find them, you could try Harry Fox, who might be nice enough to steer you in the right direction if they don't deal with Mraeros. Oh, I should add that you need to tell the publisher how long your recorded version is in addition to how many copies you plan to press. I think they emailed me a form to fill out.

Well, it was something of a sharp right turn after the Lacy. I enjoyed them all equally, in any case.

Steve Lacy - Threads (Horo) Kid Sheik Colar - The Sheik of Araby (504) Doc Paulin Brass Band - Doc Paulin's Marching Band (Folkways)

Last night I spun a bunch of (mostly) raw gospel 45s: The Violinaires - Call on Him / I Don't Know (Checker). The slickest of the bunch. Bro. Sammie Cheatam - Candidate for Heaven / Troubles of the World (Gospel Souvineer [sic]) Rev. Johnny L. Jones (The Hurricane) - Let it Shiine / Prayer #2 (Jewel) Rev. Johnny L. Jones (The Hurricane) - I Came to Preach a Sermon / Prayer for the Elderly (Jewel) Willie Morganfield - What is This / He Works That Way (Jewel). Rev. Morganfield was Muddy Waters' cousin, and was the pastor of Bell Grove Baptist Church in Clarksdale, Mississippi. The Consolers - On God's Word / Waiting for My Child (Nashboro). I really enjoyed this one, by a husband and wife team from Florida. The Staple Singers - Help Me Jesus / I Had a Dream (Vee-Jay) The Staple Singers - Standing at the Bedside of My Neighbor / I'll Fly Away (D-Town). From what I can tell, the D-Town was made around 1963 or 1964, between the Staples' contracts with Riverside and Epic. This is the slowest "Beside of a Neighbor" I've ever heard; they don't get all the verses in.

I've stayed out of this, and I certainly didn't want to mention 78s, because I didn't want to appear crazy. I collect shellac for a lot of reasons, and sound quality is only part of it. But I did a synchronized one-to-one comparison tonight, similar to what Jim did. Yesterday I bought the 1946 Esquire Award Winners album, a two-disc 12" set on RCA Victor. I felt a little silly buying it, since I have the four tracks on CD, but it was so cheap, the records were in such excellent condition, and the graphics of the album so cool that I couldn't resist. I started side one and the RCA/Bluebird CD Esquire's All-American Hot Jazz Sessions at the same time, and switched back and forth between the two. It was apparent from one switch that the 78 sounded "better" - the sound was richer, with more high end - a wider frequently response in general. The CD sounded thin and compressed, even though it didn't have the surface noise the 78 had. I found the surface noise mild and unobtrusive - and the sonic trade-off totally justified it, in my opinion. I know that, that to some extent, this says more about the mastering than the medium. The King Oliver Off the Record CD shows how great a CD transparently mastered from excellent 78s can sound. But in many cases, the only CD (or LP) versions of older music available are those that sacrifice frequencies to eliminate surface noise. My very qualified position is that in some cases, for music recorded during the 78 era, the original 78s can sound better than later than reissues. This is even more conditional than with LPs - the record has to be in excellent condition, played on good equipment with the right stylus. But sometimes 78s win.

Oh, it's not anything that would help figure things out in the long run - it's just me. I tried to put together a good one for that last BFT, but to be honest, by the time it came around, I was regretting that I had signed up to do it. Part of it is the time investment. Everybody plays differently of course, but even to participate as a listener involved a good bit of time the way I did it - multiple listens, and I would pull stuff off my shelves to compare, trying to figure who musicians were. Actually, the BFT was starting to feel like work for me. And while I discovered some great music via the BFTs, I also spent a lot of time listening to stuff that wasn't very interesting to me, and about which I had nothing to say. (I hope I'm not offending anyone by saying that - again, it's just me.) I've already got far more records and CDs than I can reasonably listen to, and the idea of diverting time away from music that I know I like to music that I didn't choose and may or may not like has become less appealing. In the end, I think it's a matter of, "That was fun, but I've done it, and don't need to do it again." At least for a while. Some time away might put me in a frame of mind where the BFT would be fun again. But if Paul presents a BFT, I'm in.

When I joined this forum in 2009, the Blindfold Test was one of the things that I was most excited about. For a long time I participated every month, and managed the BFT for four years. I kind of burned out on the BFT - there were a lot of reasons for this, but I don't think that it's just me. I notice that there are many O board members who used to participate in the BFTs that don't anymore. Maybe it's the kind of thing that needs a steady stream of new blood. I just know that I'm done for now. But it's such a cool thing that I hope it doesn't die, even if I'm not interested in participating (either as a presenter or listener) anytime soon. I would encourage newer members to give it a try.

I'm listening to Cecil Taylor's Looking Ahead tonight for the first time in a while, and I'm really taken with vibraphonist Earl Griffith's playing. His improvising is strong, and even though he presumably is coming from a more conventional orientation than Taylor (as was just about everybody in 1958), he complements Taylor's vision well. According to Donald Clarke, Griffith was born in Brooklyn in 1926. Other than that bit of information, I have been able to find little about Griffith in print or on the web. I had believed that the Looking Ahead album was Griffith's only recording, because that's what I had read. But a little digging reveals that he plays on one track of Themes for African Drums by Guy Warren, aka Kofi Bhanaba. I have no idea what this 1958 album sounds like, but I just ordered a copy from an Ebay vendor, because Earl Griffith impressed me so much tonight. Does anyone have any other information or opinions about this talented, obscure musician?

Half a dozen klezmer discs, including this nice 1921 Brunswick by Israel Hochman's band. And I didn't realize until Google told me tonight that one of the evening's spins, a 1913 Columbia record by Abe Elinkrig's Orchestra, is from the first klezmer session made in America. I found a picture online, but the label is a nearly illegible brown "magic notes" design.

Johnny Littlejohn - So-Called Friends (Rooster Blues)

Miroslav Vitous - Infinite Search (Embryo)

Steve Lacy - The Crust (Emanem)

Stanley Turrentine - The Man (Time). I believe The Magnificent Goldberg was with me when I bought this.

Jazz at the Philharmonic (Stinson). Not the first recorded JATP concert, but the first one issued. Also have this on 78.

Ben Pollock Featuring Benny Goodman (RCA "X" 10")