Brad

In response to what Mike had to say, I think he's quite comparable to Bennie and as far as being no J.J., heck who was? Matthew's sound is a bit sharper than Bennie's, whose sound is fuller but he has a good choice of songs and I think he and Ernie Henry complement each other. Everything is quite swinging here. Let's start it off with Out of Nowhere and Joram from Matthew, Ernie Henry (as), Joe Knight (p), Wilbur Ware (b) and Art Taylor (ds) These are both taken at a medium pace and are fairly short unfortunately. In Out of Nowhere, there is a nice opening latin rhythm and Art Taylor gives it a nice steady beat to propel the band. Matthew has a short but understated solo and Ernie contributes some short nice blowing. After a short piano solo, Matthew comes back followed by a nice out chorus. Just a fine effort here. In Joram, again it's at the medium beat. After the melody stated, Matthew takes over, with nice backup from Joe Knight and then Ernie chimes in with again Art Taylor providing solid support. Again, as the liner notes points out, the emphasis is on swinging and that's what's is achieved. Matthew and Ernie always sound good together. Sweet Georgia Brown is a bit crisper and faster and Matthew takes a longer solo, stretching out some. The soloists never really dominate. The collective effort provides the result.

I find it hard to disagree with ralphie boy but I actually do like the Johnny Richards and Quincy Jones material. This is one of my favorite Mosaics and is responsible for getting into Sonny in a big way. There may be something to the way Sonny played but that's the way he played throughout his career and I like the results. He's not who evolved his style. He basically had a style and he threw the gauntlet down. When you can pick it up. Like I said I wasn't a huge Sonny fan before I got the Mosaic and 9 discs didn't bore me. Plus this material nicely dovetails with his Verve material from that era. So if you get that and the Verve material, you've got a good chunk of Sonny.

I've just started using Brian for the Uptown project. Since I will probably be done soon I'm glad to help out if you decide to use Brian.

All right, I've finished up one date. As soon as I finish up the other three dates I have, I'll be emailing it to Mike. If others would like to give me the information, please do. This is fun and I wouldn't mind doing it if others give me the information. BTW, for those who may be a little daunted by it, if you follow Mike's tutorial, you won't have a problem.

Okay, so who was Matthew Gee? There's not much in the web about him but he was part of what was called "brooklyn bebop". Gee started out playing trumpet, switched to baritone horn and settled on trombone when he was 11. He studied at Alabama State, worked with Coleman Hawkins, served in the Army and then played with Dizzy Gillespie on and off during 1946-49. Gee had stints with Joe Morris, the Gene Ammons-Sonny Stitt band, Count Basie (eight months in 1951), Illinois Jacquet, Sarah Vaughan and Dizzy Gillespie (for a brief time in his 1957 big band). He was a member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra on and off in the late 50s to early 60s and in later years played with a bunch of small combos including those of Paul Quinichette and Brooks Kerr. He only led two dates, this one and the date referred to by Mike in his post. His obvious influence was J.J. and while Bennie Green may have been a better player, this boppish date does happen to have some fine playing. More later.

Since some of the posts in the Beehive thread were starting to gravitate Uptown Records, I thought we should start a different thread. I'm doing To Tadd With Love right now and working through Mike's tutorial. The process doesn't look that difficult yet (fingers crossed) so I'll keep you posted. One question for Chuck: the album doesn't list matrix numbers or alternates. Were there any. If so, can you please post or send them to me, if it's not inconvenient. My email is blewin2222@aol.com. If that doesn't work, I can give a fax number. Thanks.

I don't make enough of an effort to check out AAJ, site or BBS so I will try to make the effort to at least check out the non BBS part of the site.

Don't worry. If he didn't, wouldn't he have a lot of Marsalis threads?

I also have the Carl Fontana and Freddie Redd one on cd so I will try those plus To Tadd with Love. If I'm successful, I don't mind doing the others if people will send me the info. I'll let y'all know later.

Chuck, I wasn't aware that those had been reissued. How do I get those. Should I pm you?

Yes, I just did an ebay search and there it was. Thanks. Does Uptown do cd reissues or was this an exception? If you do reissues, any chance of the Dameronia lps ever coming out on cd? (please, pretty please )

Yes....... We got a YES from Mike!!!! I see that BRIAN is available for download free of charge via a link on your website. I reviewed the Kenny Barron, Bill Triglia, and Slide Hampton discographies on your website and was able to find the details to the following Uptown releases: Johnny Coles/Frank Wess "Two At The Top" UP 27.14 Maria Muldaur "Transblucency" UP 27.25 Don Joseph "One Of A Kind" UP 27.23 Claudio Roditi "Claudio" UP 27.27 Did I miss a couple? No sense redoing work that's already been done. Don Beside the other two sessions mentioned by Mike, Dameronia's Look Stop and Listen (through the Benny Powell Discography) is there. I have (I believe) other Dameronia LP as well as the Social Call CD of Charlie Rouse/Red Rodney, issued in 2003. Does that cd count? It was recorded in 1984 but apparently never issued until now. If it counts, I'll try to download the software and do those two sessions unless someone with more knowledge would otherwise prefer to do it.

Paul, Thanks for the tip. I'm getting this one for xmas so am looking forward to it.

I couldn't agree more. Before I saw this post, I (not having anything better to do) was looking at AAJ and saw that Heaney thread and the self righteous attitude of the administrators. I was pretty disgusted at their attitude. What ever happened to free speech and lively discussion. I let them know it (it'll probably be deleted). They justify everything on the basis that "we have to grow AAJ." I have no goddamn idea what that means. Are they a corporation where they have to increase the profits. Sounds like Human Resources-speak to me. The whole tone, look and approach seems very stilted, even what they call forums ("Talk Jazz"). In a way it's condescending.

What about Elmo Hope's BN works (don't know if anybody mentioned it) but a lot of people are missing out on some great music. Anybody who was a friend of Monk's and Bud's had to have a lot of greatness in him.

Martin Landau was brilliant in this role. But the movie was a little scary, a little disturbing in how he relates how he had someone killed and how after a while he got over it and it didn't bother him anymore and he didn't think about it. That left a disturbing image in my mind for quite a while.

I've only picked up one of their discs, Conte Candoli Live at Birdland Neuberg; a pretty good one, however.

I've got a real dumb question. By accessing the Beehive discography, you can then access whatever else you have in your temp file. However, if you go to the main page, you can't access this. I'm not altogether sure why and are there page links we might be missing?

I guess that's the whole point.

I accidentally discovered that he is now posting on AAJ and responding to questions there. Call me perverse or whatever (I'm not sure I'm using that word right) but I find it somewhat humorous that he's posting at a board after he brought down the BNBB. Nonetheless, I'm certain I'll monitor the thread.

Welcome indeed. His efforts on the Complete Bud Powell deserve praise and any friend of Barry Harris (one of my personal favorites) is welcome here. Maybe we can get Barry here! That would be grand.

It's been a long while since we had a good Aric thread. Funny to see him threaten to ban someone since he used to get banned as a regular thing.

I'm trying to get some information on Matthew Gee, the New York trombonist, who played a little bit with Duke and only led one session, Jazz by Gee, although he did co-lead a session with Johnny Griffin. I've tried the web but nothing shows up. The best source is AMG. If anybody has any hints, please let me know. Thanks.

Yup, Verve gets high honors here. Also disappointing but nothing for the worst category are the Fantasy box sets. To cut costs, they've given us little booklets in straight cd cases like the MJQ and Dexter box. I would have liked to see something like the Miles or Coltrane box, a la Mosaic.

Nothing specific but since my space is limited if I don't like something it and don't think I probably will, it's on to ebay. So outta sight, outta mind. One that does come to mind was Byrd's Slow Drag. God, I hated that disc.