John L

Lon: I assume that you are referring to the official Download series that is available at the Grateful Dead Store. Right? What is the sound quality like on that series? John

Great thread. I've spent some time here catching up. I was a Dead fan in the 1970s and saw a lot of shows, mostly at Winterland. My last show was the closing of Winterland. I always lamented the fact that none of the records came close to documenting what they delivered in concert (with the partial exception of Live Dead, which captured them in a different period). I had a few tapes of concerts in poor sound. I have been exploring the vault and Dick's Picks series during the last month. Wow! What a wealth of riches! My Dead juices have started flowing again. Yesterday, Dick's Picks 14 (from 1973) just totally kicked my ass, especially the last few discs. Jerry caught absolute fire and played a straight hour of music like a man possessed. Thank God this stuff was preserved in such great sound. Thank you, Deadheads and archivists!

I seem to recall a Sangrey lament to the effect that Farrell, and not Joe Henderson, was playing on Passing Ships. Don't worry, Jim. I think that you look more like Joe Henderson.

Coltrane or Cecil Time?

It also pays to know that Sun Ra only has one release on Savoy.

A number of jazz records have appeared over the years with quite a few different covers. One that comes to mind is Horace Silver's "Silver's Blue." It is easy to make a mistake and repurchase that one one or two or three times.

The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble does some nice things with it.

Well, some of those 1970s-1980s experiments didn't turn out quite as good...

RIP That is a huge blow to traditional jazz world wide.

When the Sony set came out, the sound quality was an absolute revelation. In my opinion, it is one of the greatest box sets of music ever released. Before the Sony set, the underground alternative was a box set on Affinity. The sound quality was so bad and distant that it discouraged listening. The old Columbia LPs also had distant sound. The Sony set changed all that. Take a guess where Definitive got their source material.

you were at the Last Waltz? Could you see the snowball hanging out of Neil Young's nose? And was everyone in the Band audible in the theater? Yes and yes. I was right up near the stage. It was a blast. It was in Winterland, not a great place for acoustics but not a complete disaster either.

Interesting. I love Dylan with the Band and love the Basement tapes. I was at the Last Waltz and loved that. I was also at the Before the Flood tour Oakland performance. For some reason, it didn't excite me at all, and the record doesn't either. There is just something too smooth and calculated about it. I can understand why the Band of Gypsies was the next step. Something had to be done to make it raw and real again.

As I( posted earlier, Youg Mod's Forgotten Story is the shit.

I just heard this for the first time yesterday. What a beautiful record! One for the ages! Talk about musical genius...

Too bad they missed a track. What are you selling the missed track for, Chuck?

Fantastic!

Good news. Ma Rainey certainly deserves it. The article claims that she become known as Ma Rainey only in the 20s. I had thought that she was already famous as Ma Rainey before then. She was the Queen before Bessie Smith arrived.

I can still close my eyes and feel myself back at those magical moments with Old and New Dreams when Dewey would hook up with Ed Blackwell for 15 minutes or so of pure musical ecstasy. RIP, Mr. Dewey Redman. We love you!!!

John, off the top of my head (and only mentioning albums from his later days output), several that I rate very high: - Someday My Prince Will Come (SteepleChase) - The Touch of Your Lips (SteepleChase) - Chet Baker/René Urtreger/Aldo Romano/Pierre Michelot (Carlyne) - Live At Nick's (CrissCross) - Broken Wings (SonoPresse, reissued in the Jazz in Paris series) - Blues for a Reason (CrissCross) with Warne Marsh - Chet's Choice (Criss Cross) with Philip Catherine - Chet Baker in Tokyo 'Four' and 'Memories' (PaddleWheel) Thanks, Brownie! As it turns out, I have none of those. I have a feeling that a bit of time with good later Chet my change my attitude.

Interesting ideas, Jim. As for the first question, I agree with you. As for the more general question about the future of jazz, I guess that the answer probably depends a lot on what we mean by "jazz." I am an optimist in the sense that I think there is a high probability of the continued development of living, breathing, and relevant musics that incorporate a lot of the baggage of jazz in one way or another. Can we really ask for more than that?

I haven't read "is jazz dead?" But my comment refers to the perceived dynamic trend in opportunities for jazz musicians as opposed to an assessment of the absolute level of the music. Certainly, there was a lot happening in jazz at the time. But this trend was causing concerns.

I don't buy either extreme argument. The Wynton "cult" came about not entirely because of Wynton's talent, and not entirely because of the machine that marketed him. When Wynton first came on the jazz scene, he generated a lot of excitement, including rather broad excitement within the critical and jazz community. Jazz was hurting at the time. Rapidly declining employment opportunities for jazz musicians didn't bode well for the future. Many people WANTED to believe in a savior: the second coming of Louis Armstrong from New Orleans. The fact that all the necessary musical substance for such a conclusion was not yet there was dismissed (deliberately by people who wanted to be believers) as the result of youth and inexperience. Objectively speaking, his mastery of the trumpet was very impressive, and the kind of jazz that he favored appealed to a nostalgic jazz-loving generation. That set the stage for the marketing machine to be set in motion. To Wynton's credit, he always faced this huge stigma and pressure with energy, sincerity, and enormous ambition. And yes, he has worked very hard on jazz education and the promotion of that jazz and jazz history that he loves. From the very beginning, I have always wanted to like his music a lot more than I do.

For those of you who are huge fans of Chet Bakers' "ups," maybe you could list 10 or so records that you feel to be his biggest ups on wax. I ask that as somebody who has 9 of so Chet Baker discs, mostly from his early years, can enjoying hearing Chet, but has not managed yet to get the kind of deep emotional bang from him that you guys do. Thanks.

So what do you got against Stax vocals???