The Magnificent Goldberg

Does it matter more if a jazz musician is underrated or overrated? I think fewer people are likely to hear of a musician who's underrated than one who's overrated and this prevents some people from exercising their judgement. But I also suspect that more people are liable to acept as gospel the overrating of a musician and this also prevents some people from exercising their judgement. But at least they know their names. MG

Slam Stewart Rod Stewart Bonnie Prince Charlie

It seems to me much harder to find information of a general nature about South African music than almost any other African nation. So what you're doing Epi, is pretty hard. I'm not sure what period you're talking about when you mention that the Boer domination of the recording industry was "astonishingly inconducive to the recording and development of new styles". Clearly, as with the music of other African countries, South African music (even jazz) focuses much more on politics than do Western types of music, and this helps to explain why so many South African musicians preferred exile; at least until the early 1990s when things changed. Nonetheless, a lot of new South African music styles were developed in the townships. Of course there was a kinship to contemporary US music - Mbaqanga to R&B/Soul of the '50s/'60s; SA Jazz to the Hard Bop and Free movements and so on. Reggae also became very popular. All of these types of music had important political angles, none more so than Reggae. But they were all recorded. Much of this material was recorded by Gallo Records, which was established in the 1920s I think and is a major player in the SA market. I'm attaching a link to a discography of Lucky Dube (who happens to be one of my favourite Reggae singers). http://www.luckydubemusic.com/discography.html His recording career goes back to 1981, when he was making Mbaqanga recordings. He started making Reggae recordings in 1984, but also, in 1986, made a highly satirical Rap album in Afrikaans, taking the piss out of the Afrikaaners. As I said, I don't know what period you were talking about, but it seems to me that, in this period, the influence of Afrikaaners was as strong as ever, and yet Lucky Dube, not yet a star, was able to get away with recording the material he did. I do have a strong suspicion that the industry in SA, as elsewhere, put profit ahead of political correctness. MG

Buddy and Dave's birthday today Buddy Tate & Milt Buckner - Crazy rhythm (Black & Blue orig) Buddy Tate & Milt Buckner - Midnight slows (Black & Blue orig) Dave Bailey - 2 feet in the gutter (Epic orig) MG

Conrad Lester Frank Haynes Mickey Fields

Thank you Tony. Slept well - overslept well, in fact. MG

It was Green, Patton & Dixon who did it for me in the sixties. This music can be quite powerful, if you let it. MG

Usual hot chocolate before bed. MG

And I'm OK. I spend a lot of time thinking about the glorious past, which wouldn't have been nearly as glorious if I'd stepped out into the traffic when I nearly did. And a lot of time thinking about what to do with my record collection when they cart me off to the old folks home as a hopeless case... MG

As if you haven't got enough... I feel for you, Lon. MG

I can't say more than the others - but I can say it also. Keep on pushin'. MG

This is the best it gets - our daughter is 35 and we STILL feel responsible for her! (And her kids!) So you need to keep up the patience tablets. MG

Sonny Criss - This is Criss - OJC MG

I do because I own only a crappy RVG cd. Poor me - I've got an Applause LP and a TOCJ CD. MG

Thanks for that info. Perhaps I'll go for the Rhino. MG

Do let us know what you think of this Mike. I still haven't pulled the trigger on any of the Hep releases yet (a bunch of stuff from Hiroshi coming soon). MG

Indeed. MG

what projects do you have in mind? adroit as you and michael mosaic are, you should both be getting huge blank checks. Was never asking for money, just proposing the folks whining for stuff write a budget for the material they want. Never got any takers. I don't know what you mean by "write a budget". MG He means to show us how expensive it is to produce a reissue so that we'll stop bitching about the lack of whatever reissue we are bitching about. Well, Chuck should just tell us. It's no good asking consumers who don't know what the cost of whatever is appropriate in the circumstances (which vary) to produce a budget. Chuck obviously can see this, and can obviously see it's silly, which is why I asked what he meant; I can't believe he'd ask such a silly thing. We know it ain't cheap, but we don't know how far away it is from cheap. That would be useful information, in a general sense. MG

MFP issued a very nice Bossa Nova LP by a British tenor player called Duncan Lamont, that a friend of mine used to have. Nice bird in a red dress on the cover, too. They also issued the best compilation of early Jr Walker I've ever come across. Although it was called "Shotgun", it wasn't the same as the real "Shotgun" LP - it was almost all instrumental. MG

Rare = stuff no bugger wants. Here's a bunch of rare albums I've been playing this evening. Souleymane Faye - Grand ass Mamadou Maiga & Super Diamono - Reuw reuss U C A S Band Jazz de Sedhiou a Paris - Saroo U C A S Band Jazz de Sedhiou a Paris - Samaalaa Assane Thiam - Li tama di joy waxla MG

Have a VERY good one, Mike! MG

what projects do you have in mind? adroit as you and michael mosaic are, you should both be getting huge blank checks. Was never asking for money, just proposing the folks whining for stuff write a budget for the material they want. Never got any takers. I don't know what you mean by "write a budget". MG

Happy Birthday Uncle. MG

And many more of them! MG

Many happy returns, Hans. MG