The Magnificent Goldberg

This is another RCA box of 45s. I reconstructed it from a Chronological Classics CD. Image is from Discogs. What I think is interesting is that this was deliberately recorded as an album; all 6 tracks were recorded on 10 Jan 1950, when sessions were normally for four tracks. In those days, few boxes or albums were being recorded; the emphasis was on reissuing the past classics. Someone at RCA Victor made a bit of an effort. MG

Patti Page! MG The notes say it's as recorded or words to that effect, I seem to remember, though I haven't had a look at 'em to check MG

Yeah. The Funk Inc sounds and feels pretty much like seventies Prestige. The Chartbusters is typical nineties retro stuff. OK if you like that kind of stuff but, though I've got itl,l I don't listen to it much. MG

Yes. This is what it looks like. The catalogue number (according to Discogs) is CBS 450981 2 I haven't got the actual thing, y'understand. MG

A bit slow, but these were the last issued new albums on Prestige: Funk Inc - Urban Renewal - PR11001 rec 9 Nov 1995 - Prod Bob Porter and Chartbusters - Mating call - PR11002 rec 1 & 2 Oct 1995 - Prod Todd Barkan MG

The unedited Louis Armstrong plays W C Handy is getting on for twice as long as the old LP i used to have. But those were cuts to make the thing fit onto a 12" LP. Why they preferred to issue a 12 track LP rather than two with six tracks I don't know. MG

That's one I've never got or even seen. MG

I think you DO have significant adventurousness. It's a damn big comfort zone. I'm JUST getting into Gene Harris MG

What's the name of the alto player at bottom right? He looks like a friend of mine. MG Yeah. The well-to-do can line up outside their personal comfort zones if they like. My comfort zone keeps expanding but, in a sense, it's all pop music; just the pop music of different bunches of foreigners. But if the art of great musicians is that their music can get through to an audience which has little or zero musical education, then it's got to be doing so via the essence of pop music, whether it's from Senegal, Ghana, Congo, Dominican Republic, or Newark NJ. MG Oh and for each of these where's there's a when, because things change. And I haven't yet got around to Brazil or Colombia. May do so before I croak. MG

After looking through the track list, I think I'll give this set a miss. I have 7 Hep CDs of the material already and there are so many alternative takes in this! Teddy Wilson isn't a guy I'm deadly serious about; now if there were all those alternative takes of Gene Ammons.... I'd be pounding at the door! MG

Joel Dorn. He started his career off as The Masked Announcer, doing TV ads on a Philly station for a used car dealer, wearing a Lone Ranger mask. And all his productions were for a small firm of his called "The Masked Announcer". MG

Oh well, just asking. MG

If there are only 2000 copies of the LP sets, how are you going to get one over here? MG

25 May, the Resonance ad sez. Do they usually deliver on CD dates? Looking forward to these very much, Claude Bartee in particular. MG

I've tried to access BFT 168 but there's no apparent download link. I tried clicking on something in a thing called Hensman that said BFT168, but nothing happened. What do I have to do to get it? MG

I've been getting lax keeping up with Houston Person releases lately. But I had a day a month or so ago when I listened to his material all day long. As a result, I asked my wife and daughter to get me a couple I'd missed for Christmas. Well, they got me four! Something personal Thinking of you Naturally Rain or shine wasn't even available when I asked, so my daughter got that, too! Boxing day was LOVELY! MG

I'm glad I looked in today. I've been lax lately, but I'm in. MG

Happy Christmas to all the real jazz fans! Still haven't got a new computer; expecting prices to fall a bit after Christmas. MG

I'll be into that, Dan. MG

I put one of his in BFT 150 Track 18, Azure (the WIld Bill Davis tune). I know you heard it because you commented on several other cuts. And you were the only one, I think, to get 'Goldberg boogie@. MG

Yeah, I don't know why sometimes a really talented geezer gets sidelined, but it happens. MG Glad you liked it. MG

And you didn't say hello to Mr Moody? MG Glad you enjoyed it Bill. I like that Hawes sleeve a lot. Wild Bill Davis is often quite hard to identify; he had as wide an influence as Jimmy Smith, though it's not recognised. MG

Well, here we are, a new month and some answers. 01 Big Jay McNeely – K&H boogie – Exclusive 122X Big Jay McNeely (ts), Bob McNeely (bar), Jimmie O'Brien (p), prob Prince "Candy" Stanzel (g), Theodore Shirley (b), Leonard "Tight" Hardiman (d) Los Angeles, Apr, 1949 I thought this would fool a lot of you. But Jimmy O’Brien was damn good, I think. He didn’t record much; a session with Buddy Colette in ’48, then worked with Big Jay until ’52. I took this from the CD ‘The Deacon unabridged’ issued by Big Jay’s own label, Swingin’. 02 Wild Bill Davis – See see rider – RCAVictor LPM3314 Wild Bill Davis (org), Clayton ‘Bob’ Brown (ts, fl), Dickie Thompson (g), Jimmy Hopps (d) NY 22 Sep 1964 This one’s just in here because I like it. I didn’t expect many wouldn’t get Wild Bill. It’s from the RCAVictor album ‘Free, frantic and funky’. 03 Ray Bryant – Gotta travel on – Cadet 767 Ray Bryant (p), Walter Booker (b), Freddie Waits (d) NY 18 Feb 1966 04 Phineas Newborn – Harlem Blues – Contemporary 7634 Phineas Newborn (p), Ray Brown (b), Elvin Jones (d) LA 12 & 13 Feb 1969 I thought it would be interesting to see what people made of the last two. Same tune by very different pianists with different approaches. 05 Earl Grant – Sweet sixteen bars – Decca 74299 Earl Grant (p, org) unknown band Basin Street East, NY 1962 Well, Earl Grant’s an organist and pianist I rather like and not many others are bothered about now. He was a decent singer in the Nat Cole style but his most successful recordings were lounge instrumentals but usually with something extra to them. This is from the Decca album ‘Earl Grant at Basin Street East’. 06 Lou Johnson – A time to love; a time to cry – Big Top 101 Lou Johnson (voc) unknown acc NY 1965 I’ve liked Lou Johnson since I bought ‘Always something there to remind me’ in 1964. Ace issued a CD covering his recordings for Big Top/Big Hill in 2010 but I never heard about it until last year. As ever with Ace, the sleeve notes are chock full of into about a guy who’s had a surprisingly interesting career, as a gospel singer and organist (who wiped out Rev Maceo Woods at a concert in Cleveland), a jazz pianist and organist, a soul singer and, in his later years, a member of the Inkspots, with whom he was still performing when the notes were written (and you thought the Inkspots were a thing of the past). This record was a Cash Box R&B #16 hit in 1965, during the time Billboard wasn’t publishing an R&B chart. But it also made #59 on the Billboard pop charts; the last of his four hit singles. 07 Gildo Mahones – Water blues fall – Prestige 16004 Gildo Mahones (p), George Tucker (b), Jimmie Smith (d) RVG 3 Sep 1963 Some people don’t seem to make it, no matter how much they deserve to. Prestige’s 16000 series seems to have been created for Ozzie Cadena’s pet projects, though only three were issued on that series (the other handful were reissues). It was supposed to have been reissued on NJ8299, but that apparently didn’t issue (though I’ve got a photo of the sleeve with an NJ sticker on it). Instead, most of the tracks were reissued on the two LP set PR7339 titled ‘The soulful piano of Gildo Mahones’. Goodness knows what the price of a two LP set NOT on the PR24000 series would have cost, but, with an issue history like that, small wonder Gildo’s albums never topped the R&B album chart J He made an album for Interplay in 1990 as a leader and those three are his only leader issues. But he was a prolific sideman with 77 sessions between 1949 and 1995 with many of the greatest jazz musicians of the period, including Lester Young, Booker Ervin, Frank Foster, Bennie Green, Sonny Stitt, Frank Wess and Willis Jackson, as well as a lot with singers: Lambert Hendricks & Ross, together & separately, Spoon, Dakota, Rawls, Joe Turner and Lorez Alexandria. So he SHOULD be someone many of us recognise. He was born in 1929 and is, apparently, still alive. MG 08 Shirley Scott – How sweet – Prestige 7440 Shirley Scott (org), Joe Newman (tp), Oliver Nelson (ts), George Tucker (b), Roy Brooks (d) RVG 22 Aug 1961 This tune was later renamed ‘Blues everywhere’. This was its first recording, as part of Shirley’s ‘Blue seven’ LP. They played ‘Wagon wheels’ for 12 minutes, so something, this Wild Bill Davis-type of tune, which Shirley played Wild Bill style, too, had to go. It was included in the LP ‘Now’s the time’ with a bunch of leftovers from 1958 to 1964. The CD issue of ‘Blue seven’ reinstated it in its proper place. It’s worth remembering that Shirley was playing organ in Philly before Jimmy Smith changed things. In 1955 she was in a trio with Tootie Heath and John Coltrane. (Pity it was never recorded.) But Wild Bill and Jimmy are both clear influences on her and this ain’t no joke. 09 Sonny Stitt – Bachianas Brazilieras no 5 – Cadet 60040 10 Sonny Stitt – Funky interlude (Bachianas Brazilieras no 5, pt 2) – Cadet 60040 Sonny Stitt LP collective pers: Sonny Stitt (as,ts), Waymon Reed, Ernie Royal, Marvin Stamm (tp,flhrn), Gerald Ray Chamberlain (tb), Seldon Powell (fl), George Marge (fl,hrn), Pee Wee Ellis (as,ts,el-p,synt,arr,cond), Patti Bown, Sir Roland Hanna (p,el-p), Sam Brown, Hugh McCracken, Billy Butler, Jonathan Scholle (g), Wilbur "Dud" Bascomb, Jr, Will Lee, Ron Carter (b,el-b), Bernard "Pretty" Purdie (d), Ray Mantilla, Gilmore Digap (cga) + strings New York, 1974 Sonny’s Cadet albums from the seventies are pretty interesting. This is from the LP ‘Never can say goodbye’. It illustrates what Bob Porter told me about Sonny, that if you let him make an album with his old friends, you’ll get the 97th version of ‘the Sonny Stitt album’. You’ve got to put him on unfamiliar ground. Of course, sometimes that approach gives you a big bunch of crap. So here he is in an imitation Deodato track. I was delighted Jim took so long to get it. 11 Ramsey Lewis – I remember the starlight – Argo 715 Ramsey Lewis (p), Eldee Young (b), Red Holt (d) Chicago 1963 I included this because I didn’t think there were enough ballads in this BFT, so Ramsey, as a pianist not much associated with ballads, was an obvious choice. It’s from the LP ‘Pot luck’ made a year before he hit the jackpot. The tune is by Puccini and is ‘from Tosca’. 12 Hampton Hawes – Go down Moses – Prestige 10088 Hampton Hawes (p), Allen De Rienzo, Snooky Young (tp), George Bohanon (tb), Jackie Kelso, William Green, Jay Migliori (saxes,fl), Al Vescovo (g), Carol Kaye (el-b), Spider Webb (d), David Axelrod (arr,cond) Berkeley, CA, July 18 & 19, 1974 13 Hampton Hawes – Sierra morena – Prestige 10088 Hampton Hawes (p), Allen De Rienzo, Snooky Young (tp), George Bohanon (tb), Jackie Kelso, William Green, Jay Migliori (saxes,fl), Al Vescovo (g), Carol Kaye (el-b), Spider Webb (d), David Axelrod (arr,cond) Berkeley, CA, July 18 & 19, 1974 I like Hampton Hawes a lot. Sure, his Contemporary albums, particularly those he made in the mid sixties and later seventies, are my favourites, but this album is a pretty nice one, despite Axelrod, who I don’t care for much. I like the Ramsey Lewis approach of ‘Moses’, and the drama of ‘Sierra Morena’. These two are taken from a Japanese CD reissued in 2014 (so Concord aren’t twiddling their thumbs as far as that market is concerned). 14 James Moody – Don’t let me be lonely tonight – Paula 4003 James Moody (ts), Tennyson Stephens (p), Jodie Christian (p,tamb), Richard Evans (b), Marshall Thompson (jazz-d,cga), Andre Fischer (rock-d) Chicago, Illinois, 1973 I’d always known Moody was a big influence on Hank Crawford but until I got this album, ‘Sax and flute man’, I’d ever heard it so plainly. Will someone please tell me what the hell rock drums are, as distinct from jazz drums? And which are they supposed to be on this track? I guess Paul Serrano knew. MG

Thanks Bill. I thought it was on the first. MG

Yeah, my best mate saw him in Brighton some time in the seventies and said he stank (or is it stunk?) because he was pissed as a fart. Mm. Am I supposed to give the answers today or tomorrow? MG