The Magnificent Goldberg

If this is really piracy, and I've got to admit, it rather looks like it, then the major companies could put a stop to it by issuing the same material with tiny profit margins at prices that would drive the pirates out of business. Since they don't, they're like someone who allows squatters on their land for seven years and lose it. Tough. No sympathy. MG

Three days after the postal strike, this one finally turned up! Oh wow! I've listened to all three of her albums today and this is a lot like hearing Fats Domino for the first time, or the first time I heard Soul music, or an organ combo, or Mbalax, or Pharoah Sanders, or Albert Ayler. These moments aren't repeatable. But they make life worthwhile! MG

It comes and goes. MG

Here's the sleeve for vol 2 I posted them all on the Clifford Scott thread (because it got slightly derailed ) http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...35884&st=41 MG I see - you have to quote the post before the one you want...

Sorry to throw cold water on your suggestion, but if Mosaic's current offerings are selling slowly, I can't imagine that the ones you suggest will exactly fly off the shelves. I can understand Mosaic's caution. I agree. I don't think the avant-garde etc. will sell any better than the "bourgeois" stuff, on the contrary. Maybe, maybe not. You're probably right. All I know is that the catalog is looking awfully stale these days, from my perspective, and I've bought more than 20 of their sets, counting Selects and boxes. They keep offering these sales and I keep looking at what's available and thinking, "Nah, I'll pass." I'd like it if they came out with something that would surprise me a little bit, maybe target a different audience, maybe bring in some new customers, even. I think that's what Mosaic Contemporary is all about. Not necessarily YOUR type of music - but an attempt to bring in new customers. I've thought Mosaic Contemporary was a mistake for a while (well, since they announced it, actually). People who might possibly like that kind of music surely aren't going to be attracted to Mosaic by the availability of a few things when there is so much that's as good (from that point of view) available anyway, at lower prices. It's not generally my kind of music, but I think Face's idea isn't bad. MG

I suspect Bruce Turner's judgement, though it's an interesting point. I suspect it because I think he may never have seen Dr Lonnie Smith, Groove Holmes, Mel Sparks, Charles Earland (I could go on). The British critical view of Soul Jazz in the sixties and seventies was even more disparaging than the American. It was about 1979/80 before Houston Person appeared in Britain; and he was about the first Soul Jazz musician to get a gig at Ronnie's. Until then (and also since) Ronnie's was FULL of musicians whose idea of entertainment was to play as well as they knew how. (OK, I know Illinois Jacquet played there - I'm making a general point.) I believe there are far more great entertainers among jazz musicians than Bruce Turner gives credit for. But the real problem with this quote is that it deals only with the extremes. "The distinction between what is done for love and what is done for quick cash is an obvious one." Yes, it's obvious at the extremes. But most music (and we're not talking about jazz specifically here) is somewhere between the extremes and judgements of that nature are well out of order in most cases, it seems to me. MG

It's ALL done for money. Show me the musician who didn't want paying. MG There's plenty. There's the ones who are OK with $20 a night for playing in a restaurant and then there's the ones who are only interested in making money, they measure their success by how much they make, not how good the music is. There's my short answer, if that doesn't make sense, well...you would have to be there. But the ones who do it for $20 a night are still being paid; they're doing it for money. That's a commercial activity. It's not VERY commercial, I'll agree. But people who talk disparagingly about "commercial" never say HOW commercial commercial has to be before they think it's bad; they always use it as an absolute term. MG

Agree, pretty frustrating because otherwise they're doing a great job with the reissues I have seen (and heard). And they would have had no problem including this Rudolph on the CD. The reissue clocks in at 54m40s! Plus the prices for these reissues look right Yes, at 6.99 Euro or £4.88, they're pretty nicely priced. MG

There are only 3 rock songs on that disc, and 3 soul songs. And two of the rock numbers are probably better known from soul-style versions anyway. MG

Chuck Rock Hudson Rock Rock Hudson

I think you're talking about the difference between "commercial", which relates to the unaltered thing that a person or group does/do for reasons that seem good to them, and "commercialised", which relates to something that's altered in order to sell to a wider audience than it would otherwise attract, or which is promoted in such as way as to do that. But the concept of "wider audience than it would otherwise attract" is inherently difficult. I don't mean this in the sense of "mass market", which to many people means a broad cross-section of the population of America. There are many mass markets. The mass market for Youssou Ndour is the entire population of Senegal (irrespective of which tribe people belong to). The mass market for Cowboy Copas was a certain section of the white population of America. The mass market for Rev J M Gates was the black population of America. The mass market for Bing Crosby was the entire population of the West. Commercialisation, in my view, aims to maximise sales in the "natural" mass market, or to extend sales beyond that market into others (which is known as "crossover" in America). I can understand why people deprecate "commercialisation", because it means that the music ceases to truly reflect how a musician wants his music to be received by the audience, and is therefore a less genuine expression of the musician's art. But I can't understand why people deprecate "commercial". This is what I'm trying to get at. MG

Many die broke because they get screwed. Many die broke because they don't have a lifestyle that takes into account saving for retirement during the good times. For every Johnny "Hammond" Smith, who had a comfortable retirement from property investments, there must be hundreds who spent money like water. And, as you said, Giuffre also wanted paying. If he hadn't, he wouldn't have thrown in the towel when the band were making 75c a gig. MG

It's ALL done for money. Show me the musician who didn't want paying. MG

I wasn't specifically thinking of it solely in relation to jazz, though of course that's of major interest. It says on the sleeve of vol 9 of the Rev J M Gates Document series that he made more recordings than any other African-American preacher up to WWII (about 210 sides). He probably made more than almost all other African-American artists in any field. He didn't have a contract; his manager hiked him round to almost every record company open in those days. According to Dixon & Goodrich, he was outselling Bessie Smith in 1930. It's axiomatic, therefore, that he was commercial. But did people disparage him (or Bessie, for that matter) for being commercial? I doubt it. Something happened to change things. I think it was critics, but I don't know. MG

Bananarama The Edsels Henry Ford

I hoicked this post by Chris out of another thread, because I thought it kind of admitted some knowledge of this. I LIKE commercial music, as most will have guessed But I really want to know how "commercial" became a pejorative expression, and when and why. I don't think it was pejorative in the thirties. Did anyone say, "Oh, that Goodman, he's so commercial"? Or Basie, or Ellington.... etc. I think not, though I don't actually know. MG

Two boxes this morning Cab Calloway - The scat song - Quadromania Dinah Washington - The Queen sings - Proper On the first Dinah disc now - enough to take me halfway through the afternoon, too. MG

Pretty good. Funny band: Wynton Kelly; Tiny Grimes; Buster Williams; Oliver Jackson. Who thought that one up? But they play together beautifully And Jacquet plays "Round midnight" on bassoon; yeah! MG

I'd like ALL the "Midnight slows" to be reissued. It'd make a nice 5 disc Mosaic set. Or maybe 6, because there's some unissued material. MG

Thanks for this Ubu. I didn't know the Roulette had been reissued. Another I'll have to get soon. And I guess it's time I upgraded my LPs to CD. MG

Patrick Papineau Phillipe Slominsky Jacques Bolognesi

Very interesting Guy, thanks. The article made me wonder whether the US has regional measures of inflation, since different branches of the Fed seem to use different measures. Do you know? (We wanted a separate measure for Wales, when I was at work, because it seemed clear that historic inflation must have been lowere than in the rest of Britain, but Treasury wouldn't wear it.) MG

If the Economist's gut feeling that the dollar will be sacrificed turns out to be correct, that is going to tilt the balance of advantage between producing goods in the US or abroad. It's such a large and important market that it might be seen as a good bet to invest in when things are beginning to slide. MG

"My man" has words about him beating her up! That's as bad as "Stop the wedding"! MG

I think it’s time Illinois Jacquet had a thread, so here it is. I had a little search around the board for Illinois and found lots of threads about his Mosaic box and not a lot about his later work. I thought I’d start by listing his albums (those I know about) as a leader or co-leader, including the original compilations of his early singles (ie the LPs on which those singles first appeared). Here we go. 01 JATP first concert – Mercury MG35005, 35006 & 35008 (7/1944) 02 Illinois Jacquet & his tenor sax – Aladdin 803 (7/1945,1,4,9&11/1947) 03 Jam session with Illinois Jacquet – Apollo LAP104 (8/1945,8/1946&5/1947) 04 The tenor sax of Illinois Jacquet – Savoy 15024 (1/1946) 05 The black velvet band – Bluebird 6571 (12/1947,4&12/1949,5/1950) 06 Jacquet collates – Mercury MGC112 (1&5/1951) 07 Jacquet collates #2 – Mercury MGC129 (1&5/1951, 3&7/1952) 08 Jazz by Jacquet – Clef MGC167 (1/1951&12/1953) 09 Jazz moode by Jacquet Clef MGC622 (1&5/1951 & 3&12/1952) 10 The cool rage – Verve VE-2-2544 (1&5/1951, 3,7&12/1952, 12/1953, 12/1954 & 4/1958) 11 The kid and the brute – Clef MGC680 (12/1954) 12 Groovin’ with Jacquet – Clef MGC676 (11/1955) 13 Swing’s the thing – Clef MGC750 (10/1956) 14 Illinois Jacquet flies again – Roulette 52035 (11/1959) 15 Illinois Jacquet – Epic LA16033 (2,3&5/1962) 16 The message – Argo 722 (5/1963) 17 Desert winds – Argo 735 (2/1964) 18 Bosses of the ballad – Argo 746 (10/1964) 19 Spectrum – Cadet 754 (4/1965) 20 Go power – Cadet 773 (3/1966) 21 Bottoms up – Prestige 7575 (3/1968) 22 The king – Prestige 7597 (8/1968) 23 The soul explosion – Prestige 7629 (3/1969) 24 Blues: that’s me – Prestige 7731 (9/1969) 25 Genius at work - Black Lion 30118 (4/1971) 26 Illinois Jacquet with Wild Bill vols 1 & 2 - Black & Blue 33044 & 33082 (1/1973) 27 Jazz at Town Hall – JRC 11433 (7/1973) 28 Illinois Jacquet's birthday party – JRC 11434 (10/1973) 29 Illinois Jacquet with Milt & Jo - Black & Blue 33070 (1/1974) 30 Bottoms up - Black & Blue 33710 (1/1974) 31 Illinois Jacquet - Rotary Club of Minden KE500 (8/1974) 32 The last blues album (with Rich & McGriff) - Groove Merchant 3303 (10/1974) 33 Jacquet’s street - Black & Blue 33112 (7/1976) 34 Texas tenors (with Buddy Tate) – Riff (Dutch) 658006 (10/1976) 35 Illinois Jacquet – Riff 658001 (10/1976) 36 Live at Schaffhausen – Storyville 8357 (3/1978) 37 Midnight slows vol 8 - Black & Blue 33135 (3/1978) 38 God bless my solo - Black & Blue 33167 (3/1978) 39 Illinois Jacquet in swinging Europe - Skarby International (Swe) SLP00001 (8/1978) 40 Illinois Jacquet all stars – JSP 1014 (6/1980) 41 Battle of the horns - East World (Jap) 80189 (9/1980) 42 Jacquet’s got it – Atlantic 81816 (8/1987) Of course, Illinois wasn’t the leader of that first JATP concert – no one was. But it really made his name, so I’ve included it. Because his Verve discography is so complex, I’m also attaching a list of his Mercury/Clef/Verve LPs, identifying which tracks were reissues from which prior LPs. ILLINOIS_JACQUET_CLEF___VERVE_LIST_REISSUES_IDENTIFIED.doc Actually, this is a pretty short list for such an important player and one who had such a long career. Surely there must have been more after the Atlantic session? Reissues 01 has been reissued on CD and is available. 02-5 were included in a Mosaic box. Proper and Quadromania also have 4 CD sets covering this period. There are also Chronological Classics covering this period. 03 has also been reissued on Delmark – available. 06-13 material has been reissued on CD – often in sessions rather than the equivalents of the early LPs. 11 and most of 8 have been reissued on one CD (The kid & the brute, deleted). 12 has also been reissued on one CD (but it’s only a 10” LP) called “IJ & his orchestra”. 14 has been reissued on CD but is deleted. 15 has been reissued on CD but is deleted. 16 has been reissued on a Lonehill twofer with 17 18 has been reissued on CD in Japan. Also on Lonehill coupled with 19. 20 has been reissued by Lonehill on CD coupled with alt takes from the Epic LP. 21-24 are all available on OJC CDs 26 has been reissued (twice) on CD. The latest version is available. The two are slightly different. 28 & maybe 27 have been reissued on CD but are deleted. 33 has been reissued (twice) on CD. The latest version is available. 35 & part of 34 (with unissued tracks) have been reissued on CD on Progressive. Still available. 40 has been reissued (with a Junior Mance JSP session) as a 2 CD set and is available. 42 has been reissued on CD and isn’t too hard to get hold of 2nd hand copies. I don’t think the Mosaic included the Verve material – someone tell me. I’d say the 58 studio tracks done for Verve would make a decent Mosaic Select. I’ve got about half of Jacquet’s recordings I think, though only one sampler from the 1951-56 period. I was surprised, when I looked into this, at how much more I had to get. And pleased that several I haven’t got are gettable. Two HEAVY recommendations: “Go power” – an awesome session recorded live with Milt Buckner and Alan Dawson. Illinois is majestic on this. There is about a ton of unissued material from the gig; perhaps enough to make the album a two CD set! And the trio was ON IT! There can’t be any duff tracks among the unreleased material. “The soul explosion” – another with Milt Buckner, this time with a not quite full big band, with arrangements by Milt and Jimmy Mundy. Joe Newman takes the trumpet solos. Wally Richardson the guitar solos. But the meat of the album is Illinois (of course) and Milt, and their playing on the three main cuts: the title track, “After hours” and “I’m a fool to want you”, which to my mind is the most incredible ballad performance Jacquet has ever recorded – it drips blood by the end. Discuss. MG