Larry Kart

Are those Huss performances the same ones that were on Koch? If so, are they OK in that form sound-wise versus the BIS, because I see that I can get a good number of the Koch (Divertimenti and Overtures) used at good prices.

Adam Fischer's complete symphonies? Been very pleased by it. Have grim memories of Derek Solomons' HIP sets on LPs. Bought most of them -- sigh. That was when HIP meant scratchy scratch whine.

I just had chills. Be very afraid -- there's also a OP album on clavichord, "Porgy and Bess" I think.

But I like this "Sesame Street." Have you momentarily lost your sense of humor? Puerling et al. are having fun here, especially the use of characteristic SU voicings on this material.

Yes, pretty similar to Parlan, I think.

I was thinking more Hines, modified because who has Hines' chops? But what caught my ear, as often with Hines, was the more or less "internal" activity of Wein's playing, while with Wilson I hear melody and accompaniment (the latter often very subtle in itself and also in relation to the melodic thinking) but not much "internal" conversation/dialogue.; the "middle," so to speak, usually is kept clean/open. BTW, that's fine with me; it's who Wilson is, how he feels it.

Anyone else think that Grant Green's aforementioned repetitiveness (those repeated hammered-out figures that figure climactically in many of his solos) is kind off to one side here -- not a sign of compulsiveness/lack of imagination/not paying attention, etc.on his part but a deliberate and/or inevitable (in the course of those solos) dramatic/emotional/musical stroke. I say this because by and large I'm caught up by them.

Glad to hear that about Wein. That I liked him on that "Alive and Well in Mexico" album made me wonder whether I'd finally lost my sanity.

When I was at the Chicago Tribune I once got a fan letter from Bonnie Herman. Don't recall what the occasion was -- not anything I'd written about her own work, though.

I was referring to the "Exclusively for My Friends" material, though I have heard other MPS Peterson recordings. I was vague because while I listened to a fair amount of the "Exclusively for My Friends" series at one time, I don't think I still own any of those recordings -- maybe I kept one for reference purposes but not more because I must have felt that I probably wasn't going to listen to them much again. Lovely instrument, handsomely recorded, IIRC.

I said in a previous post: "My recollection is that some of the work that OP did for MPS had a different, more Tatumesque flavor and had its moments."

I hope not. OTOH, Wynton's fans should know that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is going to premiere his new Violin Concerto at Ravinia next summer. Actually, that's the American premiere; the world premiere will take place this November in London: http://www.primoartists.com/uncategorized/nicola-benedetti-premiere-violin-concerto-wynton-marsalis/ The key question is what do we think of George Wein's piano playing? Listening to the Mosaic reissue of of "George Wein Is Alive and Well in Mexico," which is full of excellent work from Ruby Braff, Bud Freeman, and Pee Wee Russell, I was pleasantly surprised by and large by Wein, though were times when he wanders some.

No, I don't like OP by and large, but for me there are exceptions -- for example, the trio with Ellis, with its neo-big band routines on the Stratford and Concertgebouw albums in particular and the Granz album of Basie material. Peterson himself as a soloist, except when he's channeled by those routines, I usually find mechanical and marked by faux bluesiness -- for me, chunks of too many OP solos, once things get rolling, sound like chunks of most every other OP solo; the recurrence of favorite figures is deadening and his much vaunted swing I often find to be instead grinding and airless. Finally, while there are albums where he energizes other players as an accompanist, the Ellis-Brown trio behind Getz for one, too often (again for me) his comping is leaden, for all its surface energy. A good example is the Harry Edison album "Gee Baby, Ain't I Good To You," which has the same front line, Edison and Ben Webster, that was buoyed to the skies on the album "Sweets" by the rhythm section of Jimmy Rowles, Barney Kessel, Joe Mondragon, and Alvin Stoller. On "Gee Baby" an OP-led rhythm section (with Ray Brown in for Mondragon, but otherwise the same as on "Sweets") virtually sinks the ship. My recollection is that some of the work that OP did for MPS had a different, more Tatumesque flavor and had its moments. I do keep peeking into OP land, though, in the hopes of finding some OP I like, and the album I mentioned in my first post I do like.

Still have mine, use it now and then.

Don't know where it can be found -- it's not in his book "Musings," where I thought it would be (maybe it was a set of latter-day liner notes?) -- but Gunther Schuller wrote a very enthusiastic, detailed piece about the Peterson Trio of the Stratford-Concertgebouw vintage, focusing IIRC on how OP's charts and routines, plus his sheer keyboard forcefulness, made the group into a kind of mini-big band, and thus gave zest and point to OP's solo work by channeling, showcasing, and yes, carbonating it.

http://www.amazon.com/Tenderly-Oscar-Peterson-Trio/dp/B004YFB9LQ/ref=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1440706834&sr=1-2&keywords=oscar+peterson+just+a+memory In the vein of the Stratford Shakesperean Festival and Concertgebouw albums from the same period, when OP's arguably mechanical exuberance was usefully channeled and more or less carbonated by the trio's tight charts and routines. I thought this live concert album might be good, and so far it is. There's another on the same label from the same 1958 Vancouver concert, but it has versions of some of the same tunes,

Milt Gabler at Commodore?

Got the Select. Some inspired playing from the horns, Wein himself is tasty, which surprised me (should it have?), but I did find Don Lamond a bit over-bearing on some tracks, this perhaps due as much to miking as to Lamond. Cuscuna's suplementary note apologizes for the cover but says that it's Mosaic's policy on single disc Selects to reproduce the original cover. Extra unissued tracks on the Mosaic BTW. Definitely worthwhile if you like Pee Wee, Ruby, or Bud.

Ordered two Saygun CDs.

Nasty recordings.

Here's Keefe's Quartet (with Anton Hatwich instead of Josh Abrams on bass) from an August performance in Indiana:

Last night at Elsatic in Chicago, Rob Clearfield Trio and Keefe Jackson Quartet. Clearfield set had its moments, but drummer Quinn Kirchner was too loud IMO, at times almost swamped the leader. I've been a Jackson fan since 2002, and this was one of his best nights ever, I'll bet. Dutch pianist Oscar Jan Hoogland (something of a Mengelberg disciple), set the tone with Monkish via Misha comping, solos, and tune ideas (lots of Monk; Hoogland and Keefe had been working together on stuff for several weeks) and bassist Josh Abrams and the thoughtful, somewhat minimalist drummer Mikel Avery (his kit looked like Baby Dodds') were with them all the way. Particularly striking was Keefe's boldly angular melodic-all-the way solo on Herbie Nichols' "The Happenings." Not that there is a lot of competition AFAIK, but it was the best horn solo on a Nichols' piece I've ever heard -- or maybe the only unintimidated horn solo on a Nichols' piece I've ever heard. A joy. And forceful as it was, Keefe's solo was on the piece. If Nichols could have heard it, I'm pretty sure he would have been delighted. Good-sized audience. Also at Elastic, a week ago last night, the Jarrett Gilgore Quartet, with trumpeter Russ Johnson. Don't miss Gilgore's new Jimmy Lyons tribute album, "Words Are Not Enough -- Streams," with trumpeter Jamie Branch. Unless I miss my bet, Gilgore (based in Baltimore, in his early 20s) is really going to be something -- to my ears, he already is. http://jarrettgilgore.blogspot.com

Jack Paar was neither witty nor urbane; certainly not compared to (and I know this is not setting the bar that high) Steve Allen. Paar was, however, on numerous occasions grossly sentimental and self-aggrandizing. For witty and urbane one perhaps needs to go back in time to a figure not wholly comparable to Paar (because he was a comedian, not a talk show host), Fred Allen. Desmond was not unlike S.J. Perelman?

Am not familiar with the work of Bert Andrews or David Workman, but Lawrence or Larence (spelled both ways, it seems) N. Shustak, and Ted Williams were jazz photo regulars. http://shustak.org/life_history http://larenceshustak.photoshelter.com http://www.art.com/gallery/id--a79871-b22914-c23946/ted-williams-jazz-photography-prints.htm http://www.artsjournal.com/rifftides/2012/04/preserving-ted-williams-photographs.html http://jazztimes.com/sections/news/articles/25238-jazz-photographer-ted-williams-dies Here’s some info on Bert Andrews: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Andrews_(photographer)

Don't know which musician it was that Lee felt was playing "wrong," but the only times I recall him expressing disapproval in a moralistic manner was when he felt a musician was playing "schmaltzy." Interpreting a bit, what I believe Lee meant by that was that he thought the player was dishing out pre-determined emotional tropes. "Honking" and "screaming" of course would apply, but so would any attempt to negotiate one's way through the act of improvisation that relied upon, again, placing in the foreground any musical-emotional "objects" that the player feels will in turn affect the audience emotionally in a given, predictable manner. This is Tristano doctrine, for sure, but Lee himself tries never to play that way and no doubt would get moralistic with himself if he did. How about Will Vinson? I think so.