B. Clugston

The Bitches Brew 40th will contain alternate takes of "Spanish Key," "John McLaughlin" and "Miles Runs The Voodoo Down." The previous 4-CD "Complete Bitches Brew Sessions" contained no alternate takes from the actual sessions.

I hear that the Zorn/Anderson/Reed gig caused some controversy in that 200 people asked (and got) refunds because they thought they were in for a night of "Sweet Jane" and such. When told to play some music by a heckler, Zorn said "If you don't think that's music, get the fuck out of here!" I find the over-reaction quite surprising. What were people expecting? The trio has already put out one CD of improv, Reed has been revisiting his Metal Machine Music days recently, Anderson is an avantgardist and Zorn is Zorn. http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/Walk+wild+side/3230426/story.html#ixzz0tUJuhSf2 http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/Anderson+Reed+Zorn+raise+ruckus/3234057/story.html

I have a Rega P1. It's a good turntable for the price, though I have to manually lower the tonearm because the lever stopped working. Other than that, it's well built. It's an honourable replacement for my old Pioneer, though it's no-frills and I'm not clear if you can play 45s on it.

There's also this--Why we love Antony Braxton: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128079453

Joe Morris (the guitarist) writes about Weight/Counterweight here: http://ageofeverything.blogspot.com/2010/02/weightcounterweight-bill-dixon.html

Exposure, Let the Power Fall, No Pussyfooting.

Yes and on the Cosmic Music sessions as well.

I bought the Fillmore Concerts box and don't recommend it. It does have At Fillmore (sort of) and the live tracks from Eat a Peach plus others, but it didn't sound as great as the vinyl and they dicked around with one of the songs (Elizabeth Reed, I think), taking half of it from one night, half from the other as opposed to the original released version. The deluxe edition looks tempting and has a song that wasn't on the Fillmore Concerts box.

One more Heath: Jimmy Heath's son, James Mtume, was a jazz percussionist in the 1970s.

One of jazz's great what ifs. Coltrane's latter-day bands were often augmented with additional percussionists and the live documents and Interstellar Space focus on the relationship between sax and drums. But Expressions and the session released as Stellar Regions suggest a different direction.

Strange, especially when the Ra Nothing Is... CD w/ extra tracks is still in print as a single. They just keep re-ordering the tracks. Looks like they found even more stuff from the tour.

I actually resisted until 1993. First CD was a compilation of John Peel Soft Machine recordings. Started buying them by the armful a year or two later. By then, most of the major labels started getting their act together with reissues, so I missed out on a lot of the crappy initial releases.

ESP seems to be reissuing its reissues. (The Simmons and Sun Ra - College Tour.) Maybe we'll finally get Ayler's Spiritual Unity released on ESP with the additional title from that session.

That concert is going to be amazing. Wish I could make it too. (Info is here, for those who don't know what we are on about: http://anthonybraxton.wordpress.com/ ) Fortunately, I saw the 12+1tet and the Sonic Genome Project earlier this year. I took my 2-year-old to the latter event and Braxton walked over and spoke to us. It was neat to finally meet him.

A 4 CD set with Gerry Hemingway is being released this month on Mode Records. http://www.gerryhemingway.com/news.html Also, three more have just come out on Leo Records: another four disc set from the Standards Quartet, a duo with Ann Rhodes called GTM (Syntax) 2003 and a duo with Chris Jonas and trio with Jonas and Molly Sturges called GTM (Outpost) 2003.

Haven't read it in years, but really enjoyed it when I first read it.

More good news. I've been lusting after the Konitz title since I ran across it. The Sun Ra title is one of my favorites by him. Does anyone know if the new edition will include the LP tracks that were left off the previous CD release? No, unfortunately the missing LP tracks aren't on the new edition.

Nice cover version of Harold Mabern's "The Beehive" on it.

"Soul Mate," Andrew Hill, from the Mosaic Select (Blue Note version).

I love From No Time to Rag Time on hat art, which covers Rudd, Braxton, Mingus, Ornette and more. Lauren Newton's singing is amazing.

He's just a kid. It's better than uploading videos of tired power chords to youtube.

. Michael Fitzgerald's chronology of Blakey's Jazz Messengers indicates Woody Shaw, Carlos Garnett, George Cables and Jan Arnet. Gene Santoro's book on Mingus 'Myself when I am real' says he played in June 1969 at the Village Vanguard with Bill Hardman, Charles McPherson, Billy Robinson on tenor and Dannie Richmond and had the same group at Cliff Walk Manor. Santoro isn't always a good source for this sort of information (read the section on Mingus at Monterey), but Brian Priestley lists the same personnel in his book.

I've seen her perform with Braxton's 12+1tet. She definitely deserves wider recognition.

I'm a big Dunlop fan too. My favourite of Monk's drummers.

I'm interested in the Bitches Brew reissues. The first CD release sounded horrible. The second came with Disc 1 covered in glue. Never thought the CD issues came close to the original vinyl, which is the best place to appreciate Harvey Brooks' bass. Wonder what the extras will be? I'd be interested in hearing outtakes from the session rather than the later stuff that was placed on the Bitches Brew coattails for the box set.