JSngry

In theory, yes.

Kirk Douglas Tommy Kirk Dorsey Burnette

Ok, it'd been done before, but George Butler weren't no Francis Wolff. Wolff had a touch with this stuff, Butler was just touching it in an inappropriate manner.

Tommy Dickie Harry Potter

Same album, same band, less "production": and then with a little bit more: Frankly, I can hear the difference in any of it, but I'm not sure that I feel it... Biggest WTF? George Butler WTF? is you got Lean Spencer on the record, why the hell you using a bass player?

Thanks to Laton for his ongoing pimping of the McLean Prestiges. Long had a gap here (or in the case of CDs, a vacuum), and this thread was the straw that stirred the remediational 1-clicking this evening.

All the Jackie McLean Prestige CDs + Bird/Benedetti Mosaic, both long overdue. CD gappage filled. That's a lot of alto, but no, not a problem here, not with these.

Not common, but one of my colleagues in Atlanta is pretty eccentric about reeds. He went through a period where he kept his reeds in a mixture of mouthwash (with alcohol) and water. This was followed by a period where he drilled a small hole in the top of the reed - right in the heart (!), a part of the reed I never touch. I don't think he's doing anything weird with his reeds now, but he'll probably come up with something new to try. I've known any number of people who used either gin or vodka. Still not convinced that the reed was their main concern... I went through a period where I kept my reed in a jar of water, 24/7, theory being that a soaked reed won't break like a dry one, plus will be more ready on the spur of the moment than will a dry one. I found this to be true, always, but the water turned nasty in a hurry, and the reed followed suit. It didn't bother me, really, not when I was playing regularly, but if you let that shit go for, like two months, it gets as disgusting as it does impractical. That guy filing the reed from the underside...I don't know...you can llok at the reed from the top and tell it wasn't cut on the center, you got one side with rails way up higher than the other, no way that reeds gonna vibrate evenly until you fix that...and also, looked at from the butt end, I can guarantee you that the hump is not centered. When you get that, I think it's best to just play the damn thing until it's reduced to the garbage that it already is, no sense in trying to polish a turd as they say. I used to shave and sand and all that, just not worth it, at least most of the time not. Remember when folks had "recording reeds", "gig reeds", and "practice reeds"? Maybe they still do. But that was when your change of getting a really properly cut reed with good quality cane were better than they have been in a long time.

Serious consideration indeed. or These are the types of things that people can get real shaky about because on the one hand, what does that have to do with "Monk" (true, as far as it goes) but on the other hand, if Monk (not "Monk") can only have its reality confined to "Monk" then, where's the "universal truth" in it, does it not then remain and eventually become reduced to a chrono-cultural specific artifact of interest/relevance only to those who are interested in that specific thing? Then there's the whole "it doesn't NEED to be anything other than it is" scene and, ok, but that too often reduces into lazy thinking about "it" and such, so...I don't know. Museum as church, not a fan. My gut tells me that Monk can face anything and anybody on his own terms, and the results of the encounter will be of as much or as little benefit as the strength & clarity &...honesty of those who seek to engage him on terms other than just "Monk". There's a core architecture to his work that can bend all kinds of ways, but if anybody breaks, it will be the bender. You can not break Monk, but Monk for damn sure can break you. Serious, indeed.

It suddenly occurs to me that I have been extremely remiss in not mentioning Idrees Sulieman, a trumpeter who was very adept at handling Monk's music when a lot of players of any instrument were still just not dealing with it at all. There's a quartet broadcast from Philadelphia, early 1950 iirc, that bears this out to no small degree. And again to Ray Copeland. I dig Ray Copeland, seems like he always brought something to the table with both Monk & Randy Weston.

Thad Jones did as much with Monk as anybody who actually played with Monk. Anybody. And if what you're looking at is music played with Monk, hell, Monk didn't play with all that many trumpeters to being with, and of the ones that he did use, none, except maybe Thad, were at the musical mind-level of a Rollins, Coltrane, etc. I can tell you with as close to objective certainty as I can that there's nothing about Monk's changes that favor tenor over trumpet. Heads are a little different ballgame because of the intervals, but that's only some tunes and some trumpeters. I got a trumpeter buddy who always bitches that tenor players just need a reed, trumpet players gotta actually have chops, physical chops. He's not entirely wrong, but I'm like, did your momma make you play trumpet, right? So unless the point is that tenorists have an inherently higher ceiling than trumpeters, I'm still not sure what the point is. Although if that IS the point, far be it from me to disagree!

This has been on YouTube for a few months now...sounds like the Sullivan show, and represents just one part of what The Ravens could and did do. Still, seeing something like this and looking for simialar live footage (as opposed to Harlem Hit Parade type stuff) does drive home how only-partially-documented this scene has been.

Let's not forget his work with Herbie's band. Don't remember if he transitioned over to the earliest Mwandishi band, don't think he did. Also Schlitten-generated was Booker Ervin's Heavy!!! which was a pretty insane album all things considered. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4QinOXer70

Miles? Not really. Even he admitted that his style didn't fit well with Monk. And he was the one who I first saw talk about the wealth of space Monk left in his tunes. I believe it's in his "autobiography". I forget his exact words, but when he explained it, it made perfect sense. Was he talking about the tunes or Monk's comping?

LaVern Baker & Jimmy Ricks

So those Ravens things have not yet been available commercially?

I suspect that "polsters" = pads?

Please explain? Space is space, not sure if there is intrinsic "trumpet space" to be filled vs "tenor space". Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the notion? Either way, Ray Copeland & Thad Jones both handled the spaces they were given just dandily...I'd add Joe Gordon too, but slightly less dandily. And from a different instrumental approach, Don Cherry played him some Monk too.

That "clamp" is called a ligature, and it is what holds the reed in place, both horizontally and vertically, to enable a tight and secure seal of the reed against the mouthpiece table, and against its rails and tip when the reed is vibrating. When that seal is not secure, it allows air to escape before getting into and then through the horn, which is where it's all supposed to go.The object is for all air to vibrate the reed, which produces the sound, and then keep it going all the way through the bore of the instrument. George is probably playing a metal Link, which has long (*forever?) had the "knob" type ligature. Important that air does not get lost befre it gets to where it needs to be, Reed needs to form perfect seal on all parts of mouthpiece at all times. Same thing with the neck cork getting worn down - air goes out of horn before going through it. Sometimes a mouthpiece table will get pitted or nicked or whatever and the reed doesn't have that perfectly flat table to sit on. Or sometimes ligatures get old and flabby. But almost everything is fixable with the proper tools. You'll see a mouthpiece guy looking like he works in a machine shop, and really, he does.

Imagine the sonics if non-microgroove vinyl 78s had become the medium of choice for singles instead of 45s...then again, imagine if Joe DiMaggio had played tenor with Count Basie instead of Buddy Tate? No sense in imagining either one, right? Yet...market driving format drive me crazy sometimes, but I guess that's just how stuff works. Being right trumped by guessing right.

Right, i get the speed part, that's true with tape as well of course, just don't get the microgroove part. I mean, bigger grooves should allow for more information, no? Or is it a thing that you couldn't get those bigass grooves into vinyl in a cost-effective manner?

Hamiet Bluiet Frank Bullitt Dr. Beulette Y. Hooks, MD

What was the theory behind a microgroove 78 being an improvement?