clandy44

Rolf: Lot of good choices in previous posts. Some more: 1. Susannah McCorkle-almost anything she recorded 2. Irene Kral-Gentle Rain 3. Maria Muldaur-Transblucency (hard to find) 4. Nancy Wilson-anything with Cannonball's quintet 5. June Christy 6. Mabel Mercer-if you like cabaret singing 7. Boswell Sisters 8. Peggy Lee

I have the box and discs but not the booklet. Would like to buy a copy if anyone has one to sell.

Sorry I posted. Won't be doing that again. Sick of all the angry folks. Good luck to you.

Fifty Years Later, George Avakian Remembers Miles Davis By JOHN MCDONOUGH July 7, 2005; Page D7 If George Avakian were to nominate his most important achievements as a record producer, he would have much to choose from. His contributions to Columbia Records' jazz catalog have been well chronicled. In the 1950s, he helped restore Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington to stardom and make new stars of Erroll Garner and Dave Brubeck. But of all the gifts Mr. Avakian brought to Columbia, the gift that keeps on giving most is Miles Davis. The stoic trumpet legend, who died in 1991 at age 65, remains among the label's most valuable assets. Of the 26 Grammy Awards Davis and his records have collected since 1960, 18 have come after his death. Nine of those have gone to the continuing series of deluxe boxed sets that since 1996 have been cataloging his body of work. It was in 1955 that Mr. Avakian quietly signed Davis and proceeded to produce the early masterpieces on which his reputation as an innovator would rest. By way of observing the 50th anniversary of his relatively unsung arrival, Columbia/Legacy has been rolling out a rapid procession of Davis reissues, starting in January with three, including a new CD-DVD coupling of "Kind of Blue," the 1959 album widely considered to be his finest single work. In March came single CDs of last year's seven-CD box, "Seven Steps," covering the transitional 1963-64 period (and issued in April as a 10-LP set from Mosaic Records. Last month saw a repackaging of Davis's first Columbia album, "'Round About Midnight" (1957), expanded to two CDs with a previously unissued 1956 quintet concert with John Coltrane. And in September expect another boxed set, "The Cellar Door Sessions," from three nights in 1970. The object of this celebration earned his iconic stature in many ways. But the Miles Davis that arrived at Columbia in 1955 was still very much a work in progress. "People think he came to Columbia with big ideas about recording Third Stream orchestra works with Gil Evans," says Mr. Avakian. "Miles didn't have an idea in his head when he came to Columbia except that he was ambitious and wanted the kind of exposure and promotion Garner and Brubeck were getting. "Soon after we set up a pop album department at Columbia in 1947, Miles started this little campaign. Whenever I'd run into him, he'd say, 'Hey George, when are you going to sign me up?'...He would say it in a charming, winking kind of way. But I always knew that he meant it." There were two problems. Davis was under contract to Prestige Records. And he was a junkie. "I didn't want any part of junkies," Mr. Avakian recalls, "because I'd been around them enough to know that they're nothing but trouble. It was terrible to see it in Miles. Around 1952 he was hardly working and would come and sit in at Birdland on Mondays when they had an open-door policy. He looked slovenly and his playing had deteriorated. It was a sad thing. During this time when he would say 'sign me up,' I could always say no because of the Prestige contract." 2005 MILES DAVIS RELEASES January 'A Tribute to Jack Johnson' 'My Funny Valentine' 'Kind of Blue' (CD and DVD) March 'Seven Steps to Heaven' 'Miles Davis in Europe Four & More' 'Miles in Tokyo' 'Miles in Berlin' 'The Best of Seven Steps' June 'Round About Midnight: Legacy Edition' (2 CDs) August 'The Essential Miles Davis' (2 CD-DVD) September 'Miles Davis: The Cellar Door Sessions 1970' (6 CDs) But by 1954 Davis had straightened himself out. When Mr. Avakian saw him at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1955, he decided the time had come for a serious talk. "Those who had heard of Miles at all then mostly thought of him as a bebop player," Mr. Avakian says. "But I saw Miles in a different way. I saw him as the best trumpet ballad player since Louis Armstrong....It could be jazz ballads like 'Round Midnight,' but I thought it could have a broad appeal on the basis of being very pretty music -- easy to listen to on one level -- yet of a very high quality for jazz fans. That was the principle potential I had in mind in signing Miles." Jazz by then had grown across the decades mainly through leaps in virtuosity that expanded the limits of the music. But with bebop, the music reached the practical limits of where virtuosity could carry it. The great contribution of Miles Davis was to slow the arms race of technique and show that there were paths to innovation that didn't necessarily depend on hitting more notes higher and faster. The languorous intimacy of his ballads helped open that door. The remarkable thing is how close Columbia came to missing the potential that Davis offered. "Within Columbia there was absolutely no interest in Miles," Mr. Avakian recalls. "He wasn't a factor in the business we were doing, which was getting to be huge. Fortunately, there was no need for me to ask anyone's permission to sign him." Mr. Avakian offered Davis a two-year contract with options and a $2,000 advance for each of two albums against a royalty of 4%, which was only a point below what Doris Day was receiving. As for the 18 remaining months of his Prestige contract, Davis himself suggested a simple solution. Mr. Avakian spoke to Bob Weinstock of Prestige and told him that he'd like to start recording Miles right away, but that Columbia would not release anything until his Prestige contract expired. Weinstock agreed, recognizing, Mr. Avakian says, that the promotion Columbia would be investing in Miles 18 months hence would greatly enhance the value of any Miles Davis LPs Prestige would release before then. Davis knew he would now have to form a working group and hold it together until his first Columbia album came out in 1957. "By the end of the summer Miles had come up with John Coltrane and asked me to come down to the Anchors Inn in Baltimore and listen. I remember well that Coltrane just knocked me out with the last set. That was the thing I needed to push me over the line. Miles made his first recordings with Coltrane in October and we signed the contract at the same session." Eighteen months later, Davis debuted as a Columbia artist on "'Round About Midnight." The album contained the first recordings made by the now legendary Davis-Coltrane Quintet. But with the 18-month lag, Prestige had in the meantime recorded and issued several albums by the same group. With the quintet overexposed, says Mr. Avakian, "I knew I would have to do something different with Miles....In 1956 I had recorded Gunther Schiller conducting two pieces for brass ensemble in which Miles was soloist. It was strictly for art and didn't sell well. But when I heard Miles in that context, I decided we should explore something further along that line for his next album. Miles was free to choose whom he wanted to work with to get that result, and he chose Gil Evans. The three of us had lunch for two days in a row working out the plan, and the idea emerged that they would do an album with as many pieces as they wanted with background conceptions that Gil could provide. I asked for only one thing: provide an original piece that could support the album concept I had in mind, 'Miles Ahead.'" The success of that LP brought Davis the fame he had wanted and solidified his place in the Columbia roster. Mr. Avakian would produce one other Davis album, "Milestones," and help lay the groundwork for "Porgy & Bess" and "Sketches of Spain" before leaving the company in 1958. Together their timing could not have been better. Davis appeared on Columbia the same year Jack Kerouac published "On the Road." A new breed of postwar individualism was stirring in the beat movement, which embraced modern jazz as its music. Davis was a perfect expression of its cool detachment. "Miles was a natural rebel," Mr. Avakian says, "very original, and therefore perceived as authentic. The beats may have admired his coolness, but I don't think they would have liked him. He enjoyed the privileges of material well-being too much. While he may have appeared anti-Establishment, Miles was a man who very much wanted the protection of the Establishment." It was a protection Columbia would provide him for the next 30 years. Mr. McDonough writes about jazz for the Journal.

I meant to add to my original post that the Slack all comes out of the vaults of Capitol. Oddly, you can't find Freddie in Mosiac's The Complete Capitol Jazz Sessions. I'm sure there is a simple explanation which eludes my simple mind. As a Capitol artist, Slack also benefitted from the songs of Johnny Mercer, some of the more obscure and interesting appear here (there is one, circa 1942, about executives traveling on airplanes which was pretty futuristic, and the song is quite enjoyable). Oh, and if that has not hooked you, Brownie, there is some very young and able Margaret Whiting on disc 1.

Helen Humes-Swingin with Humes. Hats off to Les Koenig for putting out quality product.

Before listening to this set, I could not have picked Slack out of a lineup of Barry Bonds, Saddam Hussein and Bernie Ebbers. Nor could I have told you what style he played or when he played it. Having listened to disc 1 of this Select, I am knocked out. Aside from the sound quality which is outstanding, Slack was a helluva of an arranger and almost every cut on the first disc is distinctive for its arrangement, choice of song, quality of playing, appearance of the unexpected (T-Bone Walker!) or just plain melodic appeal (Ella Mae's version of "He's My Guy"). Anyone else have this reaction?

Harry Lin signed mine! Plus, I have one 45 rpm.

Where are the best sources for Speakers Corner and Classic lps? I know the Trumpet has the latter, but they are on the pricey side.

Victor Feldman-Suite Sixteen.

Carl Fontana-The Great Fontana.

I am not that adept at bringing over crap from ebay, but if you have $30K, you can "buy it now" a 78 rpm of the "Five Sharps" with two songs on it. Seller is in Italy and he swears this is the real "Five Sharps."

Metronome All-Stars 1956

Shorty, lp #1.

Ike Quebec/John Hardee Mosaic.

Thanks. This energized me to order the cd holder I had been procrastinating on for some time.

Terry Gibbs-Bopstacle Course.

Toshiko Akiyoshi-Finesse, with Monty Budwig and Jake Hanna.

Count Basie Studio lp #4

Joe Williams-A Man Ain't Supposed to Cry

Geo. Shearing with Nancy Wilson-The Swingin's Mutual.

Ella-Whisper Not.

Chris Connor-Sings the George Gershwin Almanac of Song. Just now, she is singing I Was Doing All Right, one of my favorite Gershwin songs (especially Dexter's version).

Akiyoshi-Tabackin-Farewell to Mingus. Probably the only album where I enjoy Lew's flute-not sure why.

Ventura/Phillips Mosaic lp #4 (Flip).