Christiern

It was a time when no studio would be caught without a reverb unit. I guess Capitol started that trend and many listeners mistook cavernity (my patented word) for high fidelity.

The trick is to capture it and save it as a new image. I use Grab, which is a part of Mac's system, but I'm sure even PCs have something equivalent BTW, on a Mac, holding down the "control" key with the cursor on the image yields a drop-down menu on which there are save and copy options. Once saved, I recommend a single click on "Enhance" in Photoshop (or Elements) to brighten the image...

Paul Secor: "As Chuck pointed out, there was much more to 1960's Blue Note than hard bop." There was also much more to 1960's jazz releases than Blue Note. It is the excessive glorification of one label that I find so ludicrous. Ditto the deification of Rudy Van Gelder. I used Rudy for some of my sessions—they were no better than other studios I worked with. In fact, I was often bothered by the slightly cavernous sound.

I would not liken life to a bunch of albums. I hope that does not describe your life, nor anyone's, for that matter.

The scans are terrible... Here's one from his site as it appears there... ...and as one click in photoshop changes it...

Much of it is uneventful, but there has over the reissue years developed a BN cult, of sorts, so it simply isn't PC to not go gaga over the stuff. A great label? Yes, but one of several. Rudy's work is also overrated, imo.

No, I'm afraid it's not in my possession. Bob Wilber shared it with me, I'll have to ask him where he got it.

I asked Bob Wilber about Treat It Gentle. He told me that, basically, the first part of the book is in good measure Bechet's fantasy, the second part is someone else's.

Day and night, I think, Chuck. The Yale edition is almost twice as long, and the funeral procession no longer walks into the Schuylkill River. I had taken the route from the day's papers and Henry Pleasants told me to have them make a right, if there ever was a next time. I obliged.

It would almost have to be the same LPs, just packaged differently. Of course, John had no hand in the production, so, maybe.... Only kidding, his name was removed from subsequent releases, thanks to Clive Davis. So, yes, what you have is almost certainly the same. The credit should include Larry Hiller—and that one is absolutely well deserved.

Responding to post #3: I have wondered about that myself. I don't know where their source material came from, but I should ask, shouldn't I? Response to Allen: Let me point out that Bessie masters were not targeted, there was general decay of all the 78 rpm masters due to simple neglect at the plant. During WWII, Columbia also donated a lot of metal parts to the war effort, these were seemingly chosen at random. I don't know what these "strange old vinyl 78s" could have been, other than plain old test pressings.

When I put together the 5 double albums it took over 2 years,because my engineer, Larry Hiller, and I practically had to start from scratch—the 4 1950s reissues were seriously marred by the accepted remastering technique of that era (i.e. equalization and reverb, neither of which could be removed. We used what we could of pressings made from the metal parts, but most of the surviving metals were all but unusable due to years of neglect at the plant. So, we relied heavily on collectors and sometimes used parts of several discs to create one that was acceptable. While I made sure that flat transfers of all the material were stored at Iron Mountain—knowing that there would be technical improvements in the near future, I am not sure that the CD producers took advantage of those tapes. I say this because some of the CDs are—at least imho—inferior to the LPs. I wrote the liner notes for the 5 Columbia/Sony CD sets, but, quite frankly, I think the Frog label's complete issue of Bessie (remastered by the late John R. T. Davis) is the best available today. The Frogs contain previously unissued alternate takes and I should add that I was quite aware of their existence, but decided against using them because the were practically identical to the issued masters. Apropos additional material, the Columbia CD set's final volume (5) includes the soundtrack to Bessie's 1929 2-reeler, "St. Louis Blues," and a disc containing 70 minutes of my interviews with Ruby Walker, Bessie's niece and confidante.

Thank you, Bev. Words fail me, suffice it to say that I feel honored by your praise for the book.

I know the picture is out of focus (most of my pre-digitals turned out to be—even Polaroids), but I couldn't resist posting this one of my two, sorely missed dobies, Mingus and Bessie.

Togo....like Chinese food?

She probably meant well, but her obsession with feminism got in her way. Sorry to say this, but Rosetta was not a very nice person and we really could have done without her Rosetta label and, especially, the revisionist liner notes she wrote. I send out my sympathy to Rosetta's family, especially her daughter, Rebecca, whom I got to know when she worked for Dave Chertok. Now here's aa case where the apple fell far from the tree. Okay, Valerie, you can pound me into the ground now.

I also came across a postal rates card that I retrieved from the mail chute in my hallway many years ago. The chute is still there, the rates were long gone even when I took the card. Oh, oh, government property!

Unsnap! I assume that purchasers of these things have not the intelligence to make a sound judgement as to their value and shelf-life.

We did it in the home of Henrik Johansen, a clarinetist whose father manufactured toilets, sinks, etc. So, yes, it was big. Chris Barber was playing an upright bass and, if I remember correctly, there was room for a pony.

In 1953, I recorded Monty Sunshine, Chris Barber and Lonnie Donegan in a bathroom. Imagine my surprise when I heard it on a concert album with what sounded like a highly receptive capacity crowd.

I could use a Cosby repellant. CosBYE?

RDK: "So now even giving money to charity isn't enough?" Talk about twisting words! Motive is important, I think. Besides, there is no indication that the Obama coin exploiters have any charity in mind, other than themselves. Essentially, they are praying upon a gullible public, selling overpriced, esthetically abominable items and making false claims in doing so. There is, indeed, nothing illegal in what they are doing, but it is the funeral director handing out his card at the scene of the accident. All I said was that I find these commercials to be reprehensible. Notice the very fine print that briefly flashes upon the screen, it disclaims any affiliation with the U.S. Mint. Why is it necessary? Because the presentation is deceptive—it is designed to easily give the impression that there is something official about these trinkets. In other words, this is a legal scam that insults the intelligence of anyone who possesses it.

I never saw Bob as a Nessa repellant.

Please explain.