JSngry

I think that's what a lot of people have done. And they still don't like it, and they do have thier reasons. Unfortunately, this whole "you probably don't like it because you're not listening to it right" thing is very Marsaillisian, among other cults that use the "if you don't like it, ok, but, see, if you just heard it RIGHT, you WOULD like it" methodology. For the recorrd (again), I have defended Scott Hamilton in these pages, and have expressed nothing but the highest regard for Alexander's musicianship. If I don't like (or in Hamilton's case, like more than just moderately), it's because that's how I feel it. Any attempts to persuaee me otherwise are really presumptuous, just as it would be if I tried to persuade somebody not to like these players. As much as I like or dislike some players, as ardently as I value or disdain their work, I don't think I've ever told anybody that they were wrong for feeling otherwise.

Once again, as far as I'm concerned, it's all opinion (unless it's an objective, prvoable, objective fact, which anything like this discussion is not even remotely close to being). That's a given going in, or should be. If some opinions are expressed more "strongly" than others, oh well. They are still just opinions. Anybody who thinks otherwise, one way or the other, is either giving themselves and/or others either too much or too little credit. Passion does not = truth, it just = passion. Ain't nothing wrong with it, ain't nothing right with it either. It just is what it is, and life goes on.

Not my first, but one I recommend to anybody, anytime.

That's all fine and well, but the crux of the matter is that one man's wife is another man's horse. No, the crux of the matter is that a smart man will have both a wife and a horse, and will never confuse one for the other. Unless, you know, they're all three into that type thing...

All I'm saying is that there's a big difference between sharing a Golden Shower with your wife & taking a nap in a field and having a plowhorse start pissing all over you. Shouldn't be that hard to see, much less feel, the difference! Then again, horses are a really beloved species, so perhaps I underestimate the affectation some have for their urine.

Goin' up on a'over to Coolgreens for a spit anduh soda if yall wanna come join me.

Own your own impressions; let's not project them onto the musicians or "jazz" in general, or certainly onto me.

In my opinion he's adding a lot of his own thing to the jazz pantheon here. He just had the misfortune of being born about 30 years too late. Here's the thing - no matter WHAT he played, he wasn't going to be starting any jazz movements or schools, because jazz as a POPULAR form of music is indeed dead and has been for decades. That doesn't mean it's artistically dead, but it does mean that the likelihood of anyone starting a "jazz revolution" is somewhere between slim and none, there just ain't enough of a critical mass folks.

Here's a guy I took years to check out because I was prepared to totally hate his guts, for many of the kinds of reasons being mentioned to cut down players like Eric Alexander.

I don't listen to "schools" or "conceptions" or "eras" or "cultural statements" - not sure what those things would even sound like - I listen to music.

The problem with so much of this discussion thus far is that it projects all kinds of things that are part of the inner psyche of the posters onto the music the musicians are playing. How much of what people are claiming is "about" the music of any era IS actually objectively about the music - rather than being about their own biases and prejudices and hindsight?

Don Preston That man the other day who had some Prestone Anti-Freeze Auntie Mame

personally I'm careful about bringing my "baggage" to listening to music. What works for me is to just let that crap go. Just listen. Shhhh. Listen. Quiet your mind. Don't expect or anticipate. Just be there. Let yourself be surprised. It's fun.

I get the same effect on RapisDhare sometimes, only there's an actual error message as a result: </h1> Same thing, use back button, click again, all is well. Anybody got a clue? I sure don't...

And, as in the case of David Himmelstein's notes to that Booker Ervin side (the one w/Dexter, purple & black cover, right?), you get a real work of art, wacky though it may be. I used to really enjoy Mark Gardner's essays, though. The guy just poured out all kinds of stuff, a lot of it not necessarily stuff that I agreed with then or now, but still stuff that just read well & reflected on the music in a "then vs now" way. Blue Note quite often had good liner notes, but Prestige, at least up until the Don Schlitten days, not so much.

Wendy Carlos Wendell Marshall Bill Wendell

Not. it's Pat Sajak, who famously had his head implanted inside David McCallum's face man years ago. Why? Because he could. Can you blame him?

Pretty sure that's pretty much how it went down, yeah.

No, that's Pat Sajak.

I have no idea what this means. "Shh - Listen" That's Daddy Talk. As is "I don't wanna hear how you don't like broccoli becuase it makes your jaw lock up and your dick break out in a rash. Just sit there and shut up if you don't like it." Well, that's more like Stressed Out Daddy Talk, but it's still Daddy Talk.

Hey, I've been a parent. I know Daddy Talk when i hear it.

Not even close!

That they did, Mark Gardner's in particular as I recall. Maybe Ira Gitler's too. But I just laughed at that while I enjoyed the pleasure of a well crafted essay as opposed to some (mostly" promotional blurbs.

Hey, opinions are what drives the music, period. Opinions about what an individual needs to say in their own playing, opinions about what somebody wants/needs to hear at any given moment, opinions about who's going to give somebody a forum to say what it is that they think they need to say for whoever it is that thinks they might wants/needs to hear at any given moment, i mean, no opinions, no music, really, unless it's the music and the audience of the borderline-and-beyond lobotomized. For that matter, opinions are pretty much what drives life. Opinions are worth airing, worth considering, worth challenging & arguing, because ultimately opinions are what determines quality of life. Of course, that's just my opinion. But I do own it, and you can take it when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Those late-60s/early-70s Prestige repackagings almost always had really good liner notes. That was the one thing I didn't dig about the OJC LP reissues, too often the original liner notes were not as good.