Ken Dryden

I feel that vintage recordings need to be left alone, other than remastering to improve fidelity. I have no use for editing by others or anyone who overdubs their contributions on top of the original recordings. Nothing of interest to me has been created, it is like adding paint to a print of a masterpiece.

B Brilliant live solo piano, out June 30 on Sunnyside. Finally got around to acquiring this 2009 release after doing an interview with Helen Sung, it didn't disappoint!

I just received the Daniel Hersog today. His debut CD was a masterpiece, so this one should be great.

It's not just Time, it happens everywhere. Publishing houses rarely have in-house editors any more, so some real howlers slip through the cracks. One of my all time favorites was in a Raymond Horricks jazz book, where he added a piece of trivia that wasn't well researched, "born in Lynchburg, Virginia, home of Jack Daniels." I guess he thought the label on the bottle read Virginia Sipping Whiskey...", or else he drank scotch...

I am not a fan of buying music that I already own just because of a new remastering, unless the sound is lackluster on the one I own, or there is bonus material of sufficient interest. My wife has attended a lot of jazz concerts with me, but I listen alone at home. In the car, she always wants to hear stuff she likes, rather than take a chance on my auditioning new acquisitions. As a result we often drive separately around town, then meet for lunch.

I checked the final draft I sent and the press release is correct about who mastered it. Heading to bed...

Water, no booze for ten more days, doctor’s orders.

I discovered that I never got around to buying the Brother Thelonious Quintet CD and I just learned of her LP with Marquis Hill doing research for the interview. She was a fun guest, though I was fighting technical issues as I tried to begin the I review that were getting very close to The Twlight Zone episode “A Thing About Machines,” probably caused in part from the insomnia following my surgery last month.

Different song, this is a Nathan Davis original.

Today I interviewed pianist Helen Sung for a Hot House feature in July. She will be leading a big band with a number of well known artists at William Paterson on July 11.

I don't care as long as a stoner doesn't run into me after a few too many tokes. I still remember the drunk driver who just missed hitting me head on in 1978, after he sideswiped me and crashed into a telephone pole, he breathed Jack Daniels in my face when he came to. I had a strong desire to pull him out of the truck and beat the living daylights out of him.

Someone at MPS ran across my review of Two Originals and that’s what led me to getting the liner notes assignment.

Agreed. One of my biggest pet peeves with Fantasy is when they would combine two LPs on one CD then omit a track. The biggest mistake was their compilation of Jaki Byard’s Solo and With Strings. Not only did they omit a favorite track from the former, “Hello, Young Lovers,” but they intermingled the tracks from the two LPs, screwing up the original sequencing badly and making for an odd listening experience.

MPS is reissuing it. I wrote the new liner notes for it and I believe they are including the original liner notes as well. It was a nice surprise to get contacted by them out of the blue, as I don’t write a lot of liner notes. It will be available on both LP and CD.

After the Braves came back from deficits in all three games to sweep them, they had a nice comeback against the Nationals last night as well.

He still sounds youthful as ever. I interviewed him a few months ago, the first time in around 3 decades. He’s the kind of artist that would be fun to talk to over an extended period.

Please hold these titles for me, I will pay upon confirmation of availability: Bernie Senensky Re-Action (Unity) - 5 Barney Wilen & Philppe Petit Flashback (Paris Jazz Corner) - 10

Funny!

Great small ball by the Yankees against the Dodgers tonight, two runners on third base ran on contact and scored easily on infield groundouts. This is the game I should have watched! https://www.mlb.com/braves/video/eddie-rosario-hits-a-grand-slam-8-to-right-center-field-michael-harris-ii?t=grand-slams

Automatically on my want list! Maybe someone can find the Monterey tapes of John Coltrane leading a sextet with Eric Dolphy and Wes Montgomery.

Ordered on Monday, along with the Michel Petrucciani.

Two musicians I’ve interviewed had nothing but good things to say about Benny Goodman: Ken Peplowski and Bucky Puzzarelli. Of course, I didn’t discuss Goodman with every former sideman whom I interviewed.

Bill Crow has long been a talented writer. His long essay “To Russia Without Love” should be required reading, if you haven’t read it, you can find it posted on his website. I hope he gets another book published, I am sure he has enough stories for one.

I’ve read that this box set was done via needle drop and isn’t very good quality. I saw it in a store and passed.

There was a brilliant article about how Tina Turner responded to 60 Minutes’ Mike Wallace series of stupid questions during an interview for a show segment, but were not used. Perhaps the dumbest one was Wallace asking her if she “Deserved all this…” Her response was priceless, “I deserve more.” Any successful artist or business owner can tell about the sacrifices and rough times experienced while building wealth during a long career or growth of a business. I still remember my father’s seven day work weeks and suffering for hours with migraine headaches in the early years of the engineering firm that he founded in 1968.