The Magnificent Goldberg

Ahhhh! The Hammersmith Odeon! I saw Ray Charles there in '60 or '61. MG

Once Groucho supposedly said to a woman with 12 children "I love my cigar but I take it out of my mouth occasionally". I only know Groucho from his films, of course. Thanks folks. MG

I want to thank you all. Thank you. We pore furriners miss a fair number of jokes. I missed Michael Cuscuna's joke on the original LP sleeve note of Grant Green's "Solid" - "Grant's tune, not tomb..." (I note with interest that he expunged it from the CD release.) Didn't even know it was a warhorse joke... MG

That ALWAYS happens. It's an immutable rule of the universe. MG

His daughter-in-law's bio says drugs, without specifying which. I just looked at my single of "Canteloupe woman" and it's a cut out. I don't think I've ever seen another jazz single that's a cut-out. I take that to imply that it didn't sell nearly as many as Verve expected it to. That leads to the conclusion that Verve had the willingness to try to push the single. So why didn't it make it? Can't tell, of course, but it could have been down to GG. MG From the Nov 63 recording of Idle Moments to the April 66 recording of Got a Good Thing Going a span of roughly two a bit years Grant Green left a legacy of sessions that could be considered unsurpassed in jazz guitar beauty, lyricism and intensity during such a short period of time. This includes the (at the time it was recorded) state of the art sessions with Tyner and Jones, all of the Green, Young and Jones recordings and the brilliant culmination of his recorded patnership with Big john Patton on Let Em Roll and GAGTG...this run of sessions pretty much ending with the recording we know as Iron City and the "two mysterious and apparently unheard sessions that may or may not still exist in the verve vaults". Is their the possibility someone can confirm whether anyone might be able to verify if these tapes still exist.??... Not me Guv; I only know what's in the discographies. BTW, surely you should go back at least to the sessions with Sonny Clark in talking about that legacy. Oh, and the period you're interested in also included Art Blakey's "Hold on, I'm comin'", and George Braith's very friendly "Laughing soul". MG

I THOUGHT it was '69. I saw the programme when it aired on the BBC and we were v disappointed that GG didn't have more of an airing. MG MG could you give some info in regards to what kind of situation this footage was first aired on. ie-was it as a musical interlude on say a UK chat or variety format where they crossed to the Ronnie scott club or something, or was it part of a music programme that featured more of the performers....I have always been wondering how this performance was originally presented....any info would be greatfully appreciated Also in the Grant biography by Sharony Andrews Green I think it mentions that some Grant performances may have been documented on African American community TV stations during the early seventies in different contexts, I definitely remember reading about musicians talking about this kind of thing somewhwere. It was a programme in the BBC's regular TV jazz series "Jazz 625" (625 referring to the number of lines on the screen). The material came from a guitar workshop from a Jazz festival called "Jazz Expo" or maybe "Jazz Expo '69", held in London. The programme was made up of some of the musicians at that festival. Very generous of the BBC to devote 40 or so minutes to showing bits of a week-long festival! As I recollect, the video posted here is all the GG that was shown. No memory survives of who else was on the programme or at the festival - I was only watching because of GG. MG

Postman came this morning, with some odd things from Jazz Record Mart On LP: Rev Isaac Douglas & the Charles Fold Singers - Live in concert Rev Isaac Douglas & the First Tabernacle of Deliverance Choir - I'm never left alone (No images on web of these) On CD Williams is a great preacher - looking forward to this. Ron Levy's first two albums (on K7) MG

Mono and stereo versions Best Steven French issues, Steven, with those numbers? MG

Good question. My guess is that this would have originally been issued in the UK on Fontana (an imprint of Philips), as UK CBS didn't start operating until around 1965/66. Certainly, this is the case with 'Miles Ahead' and 'Porgy and Bess'. That's right - Fontana. I've got an illustration on the inner sleeve of something else. Not clear, however, whether this would have been a French issue. 2 catalogue numbers quoted - 682 059 TL and 885 113 TY. May be mono & stereo versions; may be from different European countries. MG

Right, right. MG

I never paid much attention, but I asumed she was about 31 THEN! She looked it! MG

I was a teenager (15-19) in Ealing, West London. My area was the patch north of the Thames up to Kilburn - about a sixth of London. In that area, the top band was Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers. Cliff had a great band; two saxes, one doubling on piano, guitar, bass and drums. Cliff himself didn’t play an instrument. As a singer, he wasn’t at all individual, but he could imitate anyone. Cliff could imitate Blues singers, Soul singers, Rock ‘n Roll singers; he could do women or men; and he was really good at it. So was his band, who were real musicians. (A few years later, he signed up with Brian Epstein, who was the Beatles’ manager and got a couple of hits singing Beatles songs.) In the summer of 1962, the Ealing R&B Club opened, every Saturday night. The first band there, resident for a bit over six months, was Alexis Korner’s Blues Incorporated. Alexis is known as the Father of British Blues. He had actually recorded with real Blues singers like Champion Jack Dupree – and for Atlantic records. Although the band was nominally a Blues band, they played a wider range of music, moving from Chicago Blues of Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf, to Ray Charles and Soul Jazz material like "Back at the Chicken Shack". As the summer progressed, we found that other Blues bands were developing and working in our patch. In Southall, there was the Mann-Hugg Blues Menn, later called Manfred Mann. In Richmond, there was a band called the Yardbirds, the training ground for Heavy Metal guitarists; Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck were all in that band. And in Hayes, usually sharing the Sunday night gig with Cliff Bennett, there was Chris Farlowe and the Thunderbirds, with Albert Lee on guitar. Oh, there was also Screaming Lord Sutch and the Savages – not a Blues band but something approaching heavy metal when they weren’t playing the fool with toilet seats. Most of these musicians had been welcomed by Korner sitting in with his band on Saturday nights. Then Korner got a Saturday night gig up west. In the month or so before he started in Oxford Street, Korner suggested to a number of people who’d been sitting in with his band that they form a new band and take over from him at the Ealing R&B Club. That was the Rolling Stones. It was great being a teenager in West London! MG

Another big "thumbs up" for this CD as well. Really showcases Bobby and what he was all about. Also, the recording he did with Frank Wess and Tootsie Bean is a killer. Which album was that SS? MG It's called "Going Wess"...you can get it on Amazon. Thanks very much SS. Now on order; $3 cheaper at CDUniverse. MG

Another big "thumbs up" for this CD as well. Really showcases Bobby and what he was all about. Also, the recording he did with Frank Wess and Tootsie Bean is a killer. Which album was that SS? MG

Thanks Claude MG

Thought I'd put up a list of what I THINK are all Rhoda's albums as a leader. The discography on her own site includes a lot of reissues in different European countries and is pretty confusing. Must get "Very Saxy". Only heard of it reading this thread. MG

I have "Summertime" and "Take five". They're both excellent compilations. The former is about half of a three volume set on Barclay called "Ballades" - imagine a triple album of ballads - who else could carry it off? And no guitarist! I need more Rhoda. MG

I've always felt that jazz fans in particular give too much attention to "the greats" and too little to the working men and women who play all over the place, perhaps making a couple of records. To blues, R&B and soul fans, this is a strange attitude. "The greats" have always been a second or third priority for me. MG

The small public domain labels are economically insignificant compared to the big players. I'm sure the copyright experts of the Commission and most governments haven't even heard of these small labels. These people generally have to deal with many different issues, have no basic technical knowledge (lawyers ) and are out of touch with the reality of the music market. They mostly rely on "expert opinions" from lobby organisations to form their opinion. I had once participated in a EU conference on copyright levies and DRM, where most people were of the opinion that DRM technologies on music now made it possible to control all copies and made levies on private copying superfluous. They didn't know that there is no such thing as DRM for audio CDs. The Apple representative stated that their iTunes DRM system was absolutely safe, but omitted to say that iTunes allows to burn CDs, thus getting rid of all DRM restrictions. I was disgusted by the lack of knowledge of the government experts and the way lobbyists took advantage of that. I agree with most of what you're saying, Claude, (though I don't know what DRM means) having done some of that stuff myself. However, when you talk of economic significance, it's too easy to equate that to size. Small labels can be economically significant in their local areas. The EC has a Regional Directorate which could listen to the independents, did they but know it. MG

http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction...&guiLanguage=fr It seems there is some intense lobbying going on, in the perspective of some very successful pop recordings (Beatles, Rolling Stones, Elvis, etc) entering the public domain in Europe. Read "European music industry" as referring solely to the major companies. An extension will harm a lot of small European firms like Lonehill, Classics, etc. But enable BMG, to take one example, to continue to flog Sam Cooke's "Night beat" - his only classic album - at well over mid price. MG

Just back from a little trip into Cardiff to buy muesli and paid a visit to the second hand store. Got these on LP Chris Foreman (from the Deep Blue Organ Trio) is on this one. Also The wonderful sounds of Ossie Scott (no image on web) Ossie, who was unknown to me until this morning, has apparently made at least 4 other albums - all, it seems, in a middle of the road, slightly Reggae/Rock Steady vein - straight sax with a bit of improvisation backed, on this LP, by a grade A Reggae band including Gladstone Anderson and Winston Wright on keyboards, Willie Lindo, Little D, Frazer and Bo Pee on guitars, Carlton Davis on drums, Scully percussion and Mikey Dread on bass. It's kind of strange - a bit like Sil Austin's late '50s and '60s albums, bt with a slight (very slight) hint of Reggae. This is the only one of the newies I've played so far; couldn't wait to hear it. Then I went into the CD section and got A 2 CD set containing 3 LPs and some bonus trax And I had to visit Spillers, to see if these two I'd ordered last week had come in And yes, they had! No money left! Came home. MG

Oh, I didn't realise that was what you were implying. Dunno; don't think either was the inspiration particularly (though I'm only remembering Rupert Davies as Maigret in the TV series - never read the books). My view of the inspiration behind Clousseau was always Jacques Tati. MG

I THOUGHT it was '69. I saw the programme when it aired on the BBC and we were v disappointed that GG didn't have more of an airing. MG

I think it must be deleted. When I did a Google image search, I only got two responses, one of which wsa the Von Freeman discog. If it were available, I think I'd have got a few more pix. Damn fine album. Second hand may be an option (but not mine ) MG

Nope - Hercule Poirot (albeit a Belgian - he spoke French anyway) MG