Ken Dryden

I once received a book along with a bunch of other CDs in padded envelopes that wasn't addressed to me. It also wasn't addressed to anyone on our street or in our subdivision. But it had a delivery confirmation sticker, so the incompetent carrier could confirm that he delivered it, somewhere. I stuck it back in our box and hope it made it to its intended destination...

I remember introducing Christopher Hollyday at a local concert circa 1988 or 1989. He was a great technician, but he burned out the audience playing too much uptempo stuff, he didn't grasp how to pace a set. The pianist was a fellow teenager, Brad Mehldau. He made a bigger impession on me that night. I've heard both of Hollyday's recent comeback recordings and he merits hearing.

In my phone interview with Frank Zappa in 1989, I remember that he described the group with Flo & Eddie as "not really a great band, but we had a lot of laughs." In any case, I'll have to pick up this set.

I have a feeling that Bud Shank was forced into recording some of those turkeys shared by JSngry. I briefly owned A Spoonful Of Jazz and those rotten arrangements helped me promptly return the LP. It reminds me of Joe Pass' The Stones Jazz, not one of his best albums.

Right now I am watching the webcast of Dan Tepfer playing Bach's Goldberg Variations / Variations in hia home live. It is hosted by the American Pianists Association on Facebook and they will archive it.

I just saw my email and then ordered it immediately. Essential listening and reading!

I have a copy, but it is in my unheard stack. My desk is a mess...

I remember when we flew to St. Louis with friends to hear George Shearing and Neil Swainson at Just Jazz. When I brought out my copy of 49th Parallel for him to autograph, he quipped, "Oh, so you're the one who bought it..." Glad to hear of the reissue.

My big problem with the USPS is the way some locations are run. No matter how many people are standing in line, no one ever seems to get called from the back to help reduce the backlog. I've learned to avoid certain locations for that reason.

I used to trade broadcast recordings with George Ziskind, I think that I met him through drummer Mat Marucci.

I had the pleasure of seeing Lee Konitz live just once, leading a group with Paul Motian and Dan Tepfer at Birdland years ago. I love his music and have collected it extensively (114 CDs under his name, plus the ones he shares co-leadership with others), but never did interview him, a missed opportunity.

Even though I have a music library that is over 15 by 35 feet, I end up storing all my old jazz magazines in my basement office. If my wife forced me to answer, I'd have to say that I rarely look at old issues, but I just can't part with them. Maybe they will provide reference materials for a future jazz book, or be on their way to recycling or the dump after I've gone...

I am not a fan of Mitch Miller, who could be a bit heavy handed.

I used to see this LP regularly in the used bins and never bought it. Maybe I'll have to get around to it.

I agree with the sentiments about hearing live jazz at the Vanguard. Whether hearing a piano trio or the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, the sound is perfect from anywhere in the club. I haven't taken advantage of it enough while visiting NYC, but every set I've heard there has been memorable.

Dexter Gordon appeared in a handful of episodes of the tv series Crime Story. Gerry Mulligan played a saxophone-playing priest in The Subterraneans.

Benny Golson briefly appears toward the end of the Tom Hanks film The Terminal. Benny Carter is briefly on camera playing in The Snows of Kilimanjaro. Gerry Mulligan plays Judy Holiday's blind date in Bells Are Ringing.

The nice thing about Discogs is it can help find duplicates in a collection that you may be unaware of at all, especially with the retitling of reissues and changing the leader's name at times. That's only true if all of the related releases have been grouped under one master release and there are still plenty of newbies who either are unaware that they need to do it or don't know how to do it.

In addition to trying to enter my collection in Discogs database, I try to keep my text document files of CDs, LPs and DVDs/VHS up to date. Unfortunately, I always need to check shelves before buying stuff, because I inevitably overlook some items not enetered in these files. Here is an example for one artist of titles billed under his name: CDs Eric Dolphy Other Aspects Blue Note 7 48041 Eric Dolphy Out To Lunch Blue Note RVG 4 98793 Eric Dolphy The Illinois Concert Blue Note 4 99826 Eric Dolphy Out To Lunch Blue Note (J) 81013 Dolphy, Eric Candid Dolphy Candid 79033 Eric Dolphy Berlin Concerts Enja 3007/9 Dolphy, Eric Last Date Fontana 822 226 Eric Dolphy Vintage Dolphy GM 3005 Eric Dolphy Timespan Marshmallow Export (J) 153 Dolphy, Eric Softly, As In A Morning Sunrise Natasha Imports 4001 Eric Dolphy The Complete Prestige Recordings Prestige 9 4418 Eric Dolphy At the Five Spot, Vol. 1 Prestige 8260 Eric Dolphy Out There Prestige RVG 8101 Eric Dolphy Quintet Outward Bound Prestige RVG 30083 Eric Dolphy Musical Prophet: The Expanded 1963 New York Studio Sessions Resonance 2035 Eric Dolphy/Chico Hamilton Quintet Truth Rockin' Chair Dolphy, Eric The Uppsala Concert Vol. 1 Serene 3 Dolphy, Eric The Uppsala Concert Vol. 2 Serene 4 Dolphy, Eric Naima West Wind 2063 LPs: Eric Dolphy Iron Man Douglas 30873 Eric Dolphy Stockholm Sessions Enja 3055 Eric Dolphy 1928-1964 Epitaph 4010 Eric Dolphy Quintet Live At The Gaslight Inn, October 1962 Ingo 14 Eric Dolphy The Berlin Concerts Inner City 3017 Eric Dolphy 3 Dolphy Groups Unique Jazz (Isr) 26 Eric Dolphy Unrealized Tapes West Wind 016 Just as I finished pasting these files, I realized that the recent Resonance set wasn't on my CD inventory list. At least I was no danger of buying another copy...

During the many years I worked for our local NPR station, I tried to record as many jazz satellite feeds of shows and specials that we carried, though sometimes i was thwarted by inattentive board ops who were late or missed recording a feed during their shifts. In the age of the internet, there are a lot of good studio programs and live shows that appear on NPR's website, though it is always hard to predict how long they will remain on line. Here is one that I'm listening to at the moment: https://www.npr.org/2019/06/05/729918599/turtle-island-quartet-joins-cyrus-chestnut-with-global-gospel-offering

I think I bought a Japanese import CD from Red Trumpet years ago before they ceased operations. Okay stuff, though I haven't played it a lot.

I was fortunate that I started keeping word document lists of my jazz CDs, LPs and videos (DVDs + VHS) a couple of decades ago, before the collection got anywhere near the size it is today. I have been using Discogs for a few years, though it is a pain when a particular version of a CD or LP is not listed there and it can be time consuming to enter the data, especially in the case of a boxed set or anthology. I've never had the least interest in backing up hard copies to computers or portable hard drives. It's more fun looking over the shelves to find something to play. Everything is alphabetized by artist, by label within each artist, then in the order of catalog number.

We were already well stocked with toilet paper before this crazy hoarding began. You have to be prepared when you stock 4.5 bathrooms. There is plenty of unheard music to enjoy, unviewed DVDs and Blu-rays, along with numerous unread books. There is no excuse for boredom around here...