connoisseur series500

I can answer one of them for you. Ghost of Miles uses a self portrait by Edward Hopper, a well-known modern American painter. Perhaps his most famous painting is "Nighthawks" which hangs at the Chicago Institute of Arts. I love his work and am personally impressed that G-of-Miles would select one of his paintings as an avatar. Awesome! And one of my favorite avatars to be sure.

I have a 1995 Mercury Mistake, er, I mean Mystique with approx. 115,000 miles on it. The transmission locked on me and I have to get a new rebuilt one for it. Question is: should I spend the $1,500-2000 for the new transmission, or should I just go get a new car? The body is in good shape and so is the engine. I talked to my garage guy (who isn't doing the transmission work) and he put his vote in to keep the old car. I lean strongly in that direction myself, especially since it has an after-market cd player in it, and I do a lot of my jazz listening in it. How many miles can I reasonably expect to get out of this car? My tranny guy says he's got 300,000 on his Buick, which sounds outrageous to me. I am very good about scheduled oil changes and all that, though I neglected transmission oil and filter changes. Did that only once, I think. I have no other problems with the car. Worth fixing or not?

I bought this cd quite cheap last year and after a quick listen went racing back to the store to trade it in for something else. Didn't like it at all.

I love Duke Pearson. Favorites are "Right Touch," "Sweet Honey Bee," "Dedication," "Wahoo," "Prairie Dog." As someone else mentioned, he was primarily responsible for "Little Johnny C." And I would also add that he was probably the genius behind Grant Green's "Idle Moments," and Hutcherson's "The Kicker." He held the torch during Blue Note's fading later years. A great and highly underappreciated musician in my humble opinion.

Wish I knew how to post pictures here, and I would show you guys pictures of famous chess grandmasters. Not all of them had big heads, so I'm not sure about the big head=big brains correlation, but many of them did have big heads. On the other hand, that wimp who beat me the other day had a small potato head

Hard to find an example where Joe is out of form, Rooster. He is so damned consistent. Definitely one of my favorite tenors also. Moose: Really you can't go wrong anywhere with Joe Henderson. One other session no one has mentioned yet is full of beauty is JOE HENDERSON BIG BAND on Verve, I think. Great cd. One of my favorites. Big band sound with Chick Corea on piano. Beautiful tunes like "Step Lightly," "Serenity," "Black Narcissus." I also like IN PURSUIT OF BLACKNESS and BLACK IS THE COLOR on Milestone. If there are any that I am only lukewarm about it would be his later sessions where he played Miles Davis' tunes with Scofield, and his tribute to Billy Strayhorn. They're ok, but not the best Joe Henderson. Joe Henderson came from the small town of Lima, Ohio which is only about 45 minutes from Toledo. Another local product along with Art Tatum and John Hendricks. RIP Joe! We love you!

Four minutes left in the third quarter and Dallas is all over S.A. The Spurs are playing crappy ball. Looks like the Mavs can pull this one out. Wow, Great! You know, Jim, anything can happen in a seventh game; and maybe Dirk will be back. Odds would be against the Mavs winning game seven, but you never know.... Won't be online to report till the end of the game, but things look great for the Mavs at this stage.

I haven't had a beer since around 1985. I just stopped drinking alcohol as it was making me feel crappy. I could try one again, I suppose, but these weight-building potables are best avoided. Loved Moosehead beer in my day, though I was more of a Molson-Man.

Dallas maintains its lead at halftime. Still playing inspired ball... Opens second half with a modest flurry. Hmm, where's game seven at? San Antonio? Damn, dream ends!

Cool! Another chess player on the board. Takes a lifetime to learn the Sicilian. Since I am an e4 player as white, I have to face the Sicilian from the other side as well. I can play a couple of variations as black, such as Richter-Rauzer and the hyper-accelerated dragon. I am in the process of putting in more time into the study of Sicilian setups from both sides. Why do I play the Sicilian? To me, black basically equalizes right off the bat. My style favors dynamic openings and my mentality is that if I start off one move behind when black then I want some dynamism. I want pressure on white and I want avenues for counterplay. This is the key to the opening. If black equalizes after the middlegame then he goes into the endgame usually with an advantage. Both sides hang on a razor's edge. Need strong nerves. That's the nature of the opening. I remember beating a sicilian dragon in a tournament last December after wild fireworks on both sides, and I got up from the table shaking in an uncontrollable fashion. You need strong nerves and I wondered why I do this sort of thing to myself. My favorite defence to d4 openings is the Benoni--again another aggressive and dynamic opening. These type of openings are close to being unsound, but they are not quite unsound Again I try to select an opening repertoire which suits my style. This may sound obvious to people, but I find that most club players do not follow this in practice. BTW, are you USCF rated? Just curious.

As I write this, the game is late in the first quarter and the Mavs are playing inspired ball. Could it be possible... Nah! We'd all like to see them upset S.A., but reality has a way of kicking in. No matter what the Mavs have a lot to be proud about.

I made a rare post over at AAJ to say that I appreciate Xricci's management of the board. I mentioned that I primarily hang around here because my friends are here. Nothing to do with how he manages his board.

DUDE! If WE had .... !!! So so so true! Man it would be frightening to behold. Jim, you need the drafting talents of the Detroit Pistons management. What's with them and their ability to find people like ? They drafted Rodman, Theo Ratliff, and Big Ben. These guys are the types that build championships. If I were the scouting staff on any team, I would pay a spy to go in with one of those micro-cameras and have them photograph all the Detroit scouting reports. Speaking of which...interesting to see who they take with the second pick. I'd go for Camelo myself, but they've probably already discovered another potential

They're done, Noj. You know what happens after an NBA team wins a championship? They tend to win one or two more. Must be something about confidence. I wouldn't want to get in the way of S.A. or the Nets if they win. Lakers need a team; not just two superstars. They need someone like....

I agree, don't give up. Still, I think the joy for the Mavs should be the vision of what can be next year. They've got a young team and they made huge strides this year. I think S.A. was very pissed about letting that last game go. They will come out with fire. Of course, Bradley is out as well. There goes all the big guys in the middle. Main thing is that the Lakers are out.

Actually, Catesta, the funniest line was this one: "Students and workers in the neighborhood said objects are often tossed from the school's windows."

Dream on, Jim. With or without Dirk, Dallas is done. Still, they've got a lot to build on for next year. They're a very exciting high scoring team.

I only listen to jazz.

I no longer post at AAJ and I only check out the "offering/looking for" section as there are more posters over there to offer things. Seems like the crowd is younger over there than here as well. Some seem quite immature judging by their postings. Deep's posts are truly funny though. Wish he would post over here as well. Has anyone ever invited him?

Wow Rooster! I'm approaching 500 and I think I've got too much already (at least my wife thinks so.) Of course, I'm still buying, but addictions take time to play themselves out with me.

Another good session which took place around the Mizell period, but did not involve him is FANCY FREE. It's a good session. BTW, "Steppin into Tomorrow" is the only Mizell produced cd I've got. I probably won't explore any of the others, but I'll keep this one. I find Byrd's trumpet sounds a lot like the popular Herb Albert. I guess overproduction makes all the trumpets sound alike.

My vote is for the Spurs. The Nets are sweeping everybody but their road is a lot easier. The best teams are in the west.

FS/FT John Hicks, MUSIC IN THE KEY OF CLARK. Trio session playing the music of Sonny Clark. 2002 cd. $9 plus another $2 for postage in the US.

Sicilian Sveshnikov; quite popular these days with the likes of Kramnik, Leko, Shirov, employing it to good effect.

You're right, Ed. Took me a long time to look up all those favorites. Too much work! Hey Rooster, how about setting up another poll. I've er, temporarily run out of ideas.