Brad

Meow!

Ira Gitler and Dan Morgenstern. Larry, do you have any information about the forthcoming book?

This is a rather thought provoking thread and basically gets down to why I (or anyone) likes or dislikes Miles? I have heard this argument before that he doesn't have good technique but I like Miles because of how he pared down his style to the bare essentials minimalist of style. Maybe he did that because he realized he couldn't blow like a Dizzy or a Kenny Dorham. Whatever each of us have we try to make do with the best we have. Maybe that's why he pared down his style. For me it works. His tone, which I like, is instantly recognizable and you recognize it to be Mile and no one else. It's also the emotion in his playing that comes through. As Chris and others noted, there may be others with more talent, but there are a lot of people out there with talent who don't always come to the fore. There must have been something there for Bird and Dizzy to take him under their wing when they came through St. Louis when they were with Hines. For Miles to play with Bird on his seminal Savoy session, instead of Dizzy, there must have been something there. I know you didn't address this point but Miles was in the forefront of every big movement in music since 1945. To me, that's something. I don't know how you can ignore that. You can't separate the man from his ambiance or environment. I also don't think the argument that he surrounded himself with good players is all that meaningful. Of course he did, he recognized talent and wanted to play with some of the best. Who wants to play with crap? Now if you want to get into a discussion about which period of Miles you like, there's some interesting conversation there. I'm not wild about his late 60s stuff on. Everything before that I love. But that's just my opinion and I know it's not universally held.

Doesn't this prove that the beer guzzlin' fanatic himself now has a fourth personality: the Grouper. Maybe he could Dr. Freud to examine himself. But who would answer? Lenin? Stalin?

I like it and voted to keep it. Maybe it's the alpha male thing but I just like it.

Tod, it's time to call Dr. Freud or throw that bottle away!

The god damn stupid Borders messed up my reserve on Uptown and Masterpieces so I have to wait another week now. But they did give me a $5 off certificate on each one so I guess there's a silver lining there.

Fungii Mama quickly come to mind.

How about bird, sonny berman, kenny drew, paul chambers and blakey. That'd be a hell of a combination.

Curiosity killed the moose . Alfred and Francis are still spinning in their graves.

Wow! I hadn't looked at this thread since last year. I had no idea that there were more than 25. I noticed right off the bat that what's on Vol 26 replicates what's on Stash's Birth of the Bebop. Thus, the job will be to figure out what the heck I don't have and do have. Cadence doesn't seem to have above Volume 25, nor Worlds Records. Bummer.

Still waiting.

If Deep has been banned, how is it that his name appears on the list of people looking at this thread?

Here's another vote the Blue Hour. Kudos to BN for putting out the Complete set. Also, a big yes vote for Queen of the Organ. Awesome! Other favorites of mine are Stan the Man on Time/Bainbridge (little hard to find, although it's probably still available in Japan) and Dearly Beloved and Never Let Me Go, also on BN.

I've pretty much ignored his thread early in the game. There were a few good stories mixed in with the nonsense, but few at that. I'm glad he's been banned. In my mind, I can never associate his discs with the persona that's been on various boards .

As mentioned their service is the best. They're the gold standard as far as I'm concerned. Ornette, if you'd like I'd be willing to give them a call for you if you pm me with the particulars, if you don't get a response soon.

Catesta, are you sure about that ?

I have the Stash version of Red Norvo's Fabulous Jam Session which IMHO is one of the seminal sessions in the history of the music up to that time. Having the bad boys of bebop record with an established figure such as Red Norvo gave them a very strong air of legitimacy that they'd not had. It took me a very long time to find this disc. I first heard it on Phil Schaap's Bird show and was transfixed. It took me over a year to get it. Now, it's generally available on the combined Savoy - Dial box. An interesting sidenote to some of the discussion about Jay McShann is Bird's alto partner, John Jackson, who was rumored to be better than Bird and sounded just like him but never got the attention that Bird did. Unfortunately, I've never been able to find out that much information about him and google searches haven't helped at all. If anyone has any leads, please post them.

I haven't checked the new rule at AAJ but how do we define what is an "active board member"? An improvement in the existing rule, but not yet perfect.

These are all available domestically in a set. Fantasy put out a set a few years ago of his complete Prestige years. This is a very nice set. It's a wonder to me that this set doesn't get more attention.

My feeling on this question is that we're trying to predict how a couple of entrepeneurs from the 50-60s would act in the late 90s and early 21st century. Conditions were quite different then than now (other than jazz being not the popular form of music at both times). It can be like mixing apples and oranges. We know how they'd operate then, but not really now (with any certainty). Chris, who was experienced in that field, is probably right, they wouldn't be happy but it's really hard to know. On the other hand, BN was a small label then so would she have even gone to them. I doubt it. Since BN is now part of a large corporation, it's probably a different story.

David, It was Basie at Newport, which came out last week as a VME. See this thread.

Yeah, how about one of those JATP sessions or when Bird was coming up with Jay McShann. That'd be fun. Or when he played at the Onyx Club. Or how about the Massey Hall Gig. That would be sublime

I've reserved Masterpieces and Uptown at my local Borders. I bought the newest Basie disc there last week and they gave me a 10% off coupon on future purchases, plus another 15% if I answered some questions on the phone about their store, etc., so that's 25% off I'm going to be getting later this week.

I don't see how this can be good for the game. But you can't blame Steinbrenner for taking advantage of the rules as they are. The problem is with the game at present and that this could be allowed to happen. For this, you have to blame the present stewards of the game: the owners and the player's union. This could never happen in the NFL or NBA, which are on a much sounder footing right now. You have to be happy if you're a Yankee fan but generally sad if you love this greatest of games.