Brad

From time to time I pester Michael about putting out a Mosaic, a Select, anything. I asked again yesterday and the response I got from Mosaic is that "I believe he will be putting out some Three Sounds on Blue Note. There is nothing on the boards for next year for a Three Sounds Select. FYI - He just got approval for an Andrew Hill Select for February." Hopefully, something will come out and remind us of how good they were.

I sent an email to Mosaic regarding this numbering question and here's the answer: The numbers on Mosaic sets are sequential as the order is placed. The system assigns the next number which you may have noticed is on the invoice that is sent to you. That number is then written in the booklet at the time of packing. There can be some exceptions such as when a set is returned and that number is then recirculated back into the system. For Mosaic Selects, we get an initial delivery of the first 750 - 1000 sequential numbers. They are randomly picked. After that first pressing, the sets are picked at random.

Happy Birthday Aftab. Hope you enjoyed some Chet today.

Keep this man away from sharp objects. Works of art down the drain.

I just ordered this one. It's dangerous to read these threads.

Yes, it's time to throw in the towel (and the dollars!)

I got this and it's very good. I'm into my second listen. His rendition of Equinox is outstanding, almost Trane like without being slavish. Cherokee is my favorite of the bunch. George Cables: some very good solos here.

Shut the hell up. OK

I've never heard of this until now but it does sound like a recipe for disaster, everybody heading off in the completely opposite direction. Must have been something else for those who were there.

Enjoy those Mosaics. That's what birthdays and holidays are for

A classic indeed. Not a bet I'd like to make.

You don't have this yet? Man, you gotta get it NOW!

I think number one only goes to the artist.

Regardless of legality, I've heard the sound on the Beehive is pretty damn awful so you might want to avoid that anyway. Regarding Dex, the Carl Perkins is hard to come by if you want to stay legit. Keeping an eye on ebay is probably the best way.

I think with Dave on this one. There doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason how they allot numbers. However, Wesbed's post does make sense because why would you start in the middle, or even if you started out with 1, 2, 3, etc., why would you assign a higher number if in fact you're not at that number?

I've never tried this but have been thinking about it. How difficult is this to do? CD burning is fairly effortless but this seems more of a challenge.

This may be a little unfair but wasn't that the difference between Blue Note and a lot of other labels, that Alfred had his musicians prepared while others weren't as prepared. I know that Chris doesn't agree with this and since he was there, he's probably right. But that's the perception today (or the myth).

Further to Bill's point, Sonny was planning just to record the old hackneyed standards that he'd recorded before and Alfred flipped out. As Dan Morgenstern said in his excellent Mosaic-like notes for the Dex box, "Sonny Stitt's approach to making records was diamterically opposed to that of Alfred Lion and Blue Note."

Do you have the Dex box. It's got the full details there. If not, I can try to post it tonight when I got home.

Miles was always into change so it's no surprise that he kept changing. He got rid of Philly Joe, didn't he? Regaring Wesbed's comments about Evans being better than Red, you can't compare them. They're so different. As for the ludicrous comment about Evans being overrated, that's just...ludicrous in my book.

I'd suggest a different tack on Miles. Why not listen to some early Miles when he was getting his act together with Charlie Parker. He takes some good solos on these sides and he even had his first leader session for Savoy while with Bird (who's on tenor). I think this was more of a way for Savoy to record Bird without Bird having to pay royalties to Dial, which gets me why don't you get Bird Savoy/Dial sessions. Even if you don't love anything, there's lot of Miles, it's a great introduction to both Bird and Bop (although that's probably synonomous).

Metronome magazine collaborated with several labels, I remember Capitol (Cuscuna included some on the CD Birth of the Cool Vol. 2. Having them all in one package regardless of the label would really be a perfect fit for Mosaic. Unfortunately, based on what I've been able to find out, there's not enough there for a Mosaic. The Metronome All Stars recorded between 1939 and 1961 and usually they only recorded a couple of songs a year, at least in their heyday. There are basically four lps and one cd that contain Metronome materia. There is the Bluebird (RCA) cd that contains 15 cuts between 1939 and 1950 (including the famed Overtime and Victory Ball) and some of these are alternate takes. There is a Tax lp, which contains the Columbia sessions for 1940, 1941, 1942, 1946 and 1950. The Camden lp is the RCA material on the cd and there is a Clef lp of the 1956 All Stars which has 6 songs. A search turned up this CD. Since the Bluebird is OOP, this is probably worth getting. I'm not even sure there's enough there for a Select.

I don't know when this was released but I definitely vote for the Latin Bit. Really fine album.

Wow! That's a hell of an improvements. Hat off to them.

I guess it wasn't important to mention but he's also done tons of liner notes. I most recently ran into one of his liner notes for Kenny Burrell's Bluesy Burrell, originally issued for Moodsville, and reissued in 1997 by Fantasy, where Chris supplemented Robert Levin's original notes. Great disc by the way.