JSngry

OK, that sounds reasonable... but where is Big Sid Catlett then? What's the first appearance in a Hollywood film of an integrated band?

God Almighty Madalyn Murray O'Hair The Trix Rabbit

Well yeah, exactly. That's the struggle of our times, that between the old 3D/linear mindset & the new(ish) "omnidimensional" one. "The Powers That Be" are still fighting to keep the old ways, for obvious reasons, and the less relevant those ways become, the harder & uglier they gotta fight to impose them on us. You think all this Lowest Common Denominator Piledriver shit getting plastered everywhere is an accident or a trend from the masses? Hardly. You think that all this Sensory Blinding Empty Disorienting is just a matter of Style Du Jour? Not even. I say pay attention to anybody anywhere who's playing this game of "opening up" what time/place/space means in music (for the sake of this discussion, but in everything in general outside of it), because it is the present, which means that it should be the way of the future, which means that it's going to scare the shit out of a lot of people, which means that resistance will come hard and heavy, which means that lives - our lives - are at stake. There's Truth and Beauty in the various undergrounds that are alive and (reasonably) well, using the "new perceptual reality" to convey messages of freedom (as opposed to wanton self-indulgence) of mind, body, & spirit. Hear/feel them now or later, whatever fits your schedule) but by all means hear/feel them at some point, and don't be afraid. Fear will only get all of us killed.

Well yeah, that too. But I remember when the Smithsonian was somewhat active in areas not that far removed from this. Seems like a natural fit. So wtf do I pay my taxes for? Political forum, right?

Ok, I sent an email to Hanover Music/Corinthian Records asking for conductor info from that show. Maybe somebody remembers. We'll see what happens.

I remember a Comstock photo or two from some old Hi-Los albums, and I don't think so...

From 1960, I agree. From 1950 or so, like I thought it might have been, I don't know. The shout chorus has that "loud Thornhill" sound in the voicings. Gil was still doing some commercial arranging back then, so it seemed plauable to me. But it is 1960, so it's a moot point.

Hey - wtf do I pay taxes for?

Still wise, but a very slightly flawed wiseom it is.

You, sir, are a very wise man.

More... according to http://www.ejazzlines.com/Featuring-Stan-K...THE-p46805.html

Ok... http://www.tv.com/ford-startime/the-swingi...55/summary.html 1960 is the year. Wow, everybody & everything looks older than that. But ok. Still no clue who the bandleader is, but oh well.

Ok, here's a clip from the same show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6PCKUTt2mE...ted&search= We can now completely rule out it being Gil. Process of elimination, here we come...

Not Riddle. Doesn't look like him at all. Almost looks like Gil. Almost...

Now here's where things get a little ambiguous. That looks like a picture of Gil from the mid-50s, and I'm thinking that clip might be from a little earlier than that. Gil was already into middle age then either way, so a few years could make a difference. Probably not him, but now I want to know who it is anyway... Maybe it's Jack Parnell...

Don't know the studio arrangement, is it the same as this one?

That sure sounds like it could be a Gil chart! But I don't recall ever hearing about him working for Jo Stafford, and the way the announcer brings her in makes it sould like it's her show. Who's that announcer? That voice sounds real familiar.

Holy shit! I'm not a huge Jo Stafford fan, but GOOD GOD is that a great cut! Call me crazy, but is that possibly Gil Evans leading the band?

Late to the party, again. Sorry, time's been quite crowded here. The usual thanks and disclaimers firmly in place, here we go... TRACK ONE - Soundtrack music? Seems like this has been on a BFT before... Really interesting recording quality, very dry, w/some parts right in your face, others pulled back in the mix to varying degrees...Sounds a little like some Alex North thing... "jazzy" and all that. Not much to say other than it's played well. TRACK TWO - Almost sounds like Sammy Davis, Jr on the intro...Kinda hip, kinda cheesy bar music. Fun stuff, and the tenor player sure ain't no poser. TRACK THREE - "Comin' Home Baby", obviously. Short, airplay ready. The 9th in the first bar of the guitarist's solo gives him away as a possible azz player, and the rest of the solo adds credence tot hat suspicion. AMG show a Howard roberts version of this tune that's this exact length, so that's my guess. Probably form one of theose Capitol sides. Pleasantly functional, and the high level of musicianship by everybody involved is belied in spite of the "blatantly" commercial intent of the production. TRACK FOUR - Sounds like the old Columbia studio...Tenor player has some disntictive qualities I might have reconized back when I was obsessive about such things...could be Plas Johnson, but I'm not used to hearing him recorded like this. It's ok, but I'm left with a feeling of hearing more of a "project" or "experiment" than anything else, which is ok, but... TRACK FIVE - A TV theme? Wow, this one's weird...obviously badass players playing obviously cheesy music, and nobody's even trying to reconcile those opposites. Oh, it's foreign, that explains everything! TRACK SIX - Lots of bongos/congas on this BFT... Good bass/drum hookup underneath it all. Sounds like really-good-but-not-too-deep players having a high quality good time, and that's ok by me. And I do like the drummer, in this context anyway. Vibist sounds like he/she might be able to go deeper than this under the rigth conditions. TRACK SEVEN - Ok, this one I have. Woody on Cadet, "Here I Am Baby" from the Light My Fire album. Ya' know, this stuff sounds pretty cheesy on the first few 1-1000 listens, and I suppose it is, but if you take it on its own terms, it's got it's own integrity. Not at all a bad piece of writing (Richard Evans), and the longer it goes on, the groovier it gets, even if the mix is waaaay weird (as it was on all three of the Herman/Cadet sides). Coming immediately out of tenor solo hits a seriously badass groove, even if its over almost as soon as it begins. The biggest hangup is the sax section phrasing on the main melody, with Woody playing lead. God bless him, he just wasn't as funky as this chart called for (and it's written/played perhaps a little too literally for its own good). But when the section switches from unison to harmony, following the lead player becomes slightly less important (insider secret here, folks ), and you can hear the soul factor go up a notch or two as the sction boosts him. That's one of the kicks about big-band listening/playing, the whole individual-inside-the-section thing, That's Frank Vicari on tenor, and he sounds nice & comfortable playing in this groove. No bullshit, no flash, he just rides the groove and plays with a lot of feeling. No problems here. Sounds like he's heard, dug, and understood Maceo, and hey, more power to that. Also in the band are ringers Phil Upchurch & Morris Jennings. The next Herman Cadet side (Heavy Exposure) added Donny Hathaway on organ & is the keeper of the bunch imo, but Light My Fire has a few moments of its own, and Vicari's solo and the ensemble afterwards are among them. I imagine this cut will draw a lot of snide "old guys trying to sound hip" type comments, and not without some justification, but there's more going on here than just that. Woody's band at this time was full of younger cats (John Hicks is on here, btw, & a fresh-out-of-NTSU Ed Soph on drums seems to be enjoying himself behind Vicari), and if there's a not complete assimilation of what's being gone for, by no means is there a total lack of same either. I can here the lack of condescencion just as much as I can the lack of total "authenticity", so the glass is either half-full or half-empty, depending on what you want to see and who you want to dis. Far, far worse was done during the time by others trying to do somewhat the same thing, so hey. Shortcomings and all, this is a cut which I'm actually pretty fond of, which doesn't mean that I "love", or even "like" it, just that it doesn't piss me off and that it actually makes me smile and sorat want to dance (and during Vicari's solo, dammit, I do dance. So in this case, fuck "hipness", real or sought after. A smile and a dance gets the job done here. TRACK EIGHT - Like I said, far worse things were done... The band is totally useless on this (trumpet voicings worthy of the early 40s Harry James band do not fit here...), but the rhythm section cops a nice little groove, and piccolo, hey, you gotta love piccolo (or not...). Guitar solo is stupid, but that keyboard thing is wackycool/stoopidfunkyfresh. And a modulation...9.99999 time out of 10, modulations piss me off, and this one is no exception. Ultimately a "novelty", but not without elements of interest. TRACK NINE - Oh, for the days when budgets had room for a roomfull of percussionists! Not too fond of this one, but I bet it's by a writer I usually respect. That weird little quasi-"Spanish" thing on the V-IV progression tells me that it's somebody trying to be "different" in a blatantly commercial ba, but, hey, so what? And compare the stiffass trumpet solo here to the looseness of Vicari's looseness on the Herman thing. Not all cheese is created equal! TRACK TEN - Oh god, Leslies run amock. In the name of Lloyd Bridges, HELP ME DEAR GOD!!!! Gotta be Clark Terry, maybe on that Impulse! side he did w/Chico O'Farrill, but I hope not. Both men desrve better (or maybe not, if they volunteered for this). But no, I don't think so. Maybe that Mainstream album Angyumaluma Bongliddleany Nannyany Awhan Yi!, which would mean Jerome Richardson on tenor iirc, and that sounds plausible. This ain't bad so much as it is...ok, it's bad. Fun, and not stupid or clueless, but still bad. Sorry. That Woody cut sounds better and better. TRACK ELEVEN - LOUDER, PLEASE! Now, the head sounds really good (that opening phrase reminds me of a pop tune from the mid-late 1960s, and it's driving me crazy that I can't remember which one...), what about the rest of it. Trumpet ain't bad at all, tenor's got a great tone, if a little "lick-y", hey hold it right there - I hear VanGelder reverb, and that tenor reminds me of late-60s Frank Foster, and I do believe that's Garnett Brown on trombone, so no more calls, we have a guess - an edited (nothing onthe LP clocks in at anything resembling 4:30) cut from Manhattan Fever. Own it, never listen to it. I'd like to hear more from the players involved, but again, worse has been done in the name of this type bag. It don't suck. But I don't hear any editing, so the 4:30 thing is kinda And come to think of it, that's not really Rudy's piano sound (although at this volume it's har to really tell...). I'm stumped. TRACK TWELVE - Sorta sounds like on of those Clarke-Bolan Euro/American hybrid offshoots that were so hip back in the day. Nivce tenor playing, a little Harold Land-inflected. Trumpet is thoughtful, but not really projecting a lot of personality to me. Piano's recorded pretty harshly, bass sounds like there's a bit of direct involved, and drums have a certain brittleness to them that says mid/late-70s recording. Good, but in a style that was maybe already on the verge of being played out even then. But not at all bad. TRACK THIRTEEN - I think I'm getting listening fatigue, so this is probably better than it's hitting me. Tenorist has personality, though. That much comes through. Somewhat "west coast" in tone and feel, he is. Overall though, the piece comes off as a little "generic". sorry. TRACK FOURTEEN - Interesting mix...Drums waaaay on top. Doesn't really gel for me, but I can hear what they're trying to do...I like it, and would be interested in finding out who it is. TRACK FIFTEEN - HEAVY reverb, reminiscent of what Creed Taylor did at Verve. And there is a Van Gelder studio sound to the whole thing, so yeah, some Verve thing maybe. Sounds like Kenny Burrell on guitar, but that doesn't really narrow anything down, does it... Kinda "show bizzy", but that's the intent, no coubt. No idea, but I bet the roster is impressive all the way around. TRACK SIXTEEN - Almost sounds like Rahsaan, almost sounds like Elvin...Pretty good stuff, and not almost. TRACK SEVENTEEN - Hmmmmm....interesting....there's a Dolphy-esque quality to the flute tone in the solo, but that ain't Eric. Suggestive of Eddie Palmieri, but....Don't know, but am interested! TRACK EIGHTEEN - Oh my! Again, don't know, but am interested! I forget what those drums are called, but to hear them played by a real Latin conguero is an ear-opener! TRACK NINETEEN - Detective Show Jazz. Not a fan of the idiom as a rule, and this is no exception. Sorry. But I bet that altoist is a "name"... Art Pepper? TRACK TWENTY - Marimba fusion? Who knew? And then vibes swing. That I knew about. The Jackal? TRACK TWENTY-ONE - More Detective Show Jazz...Still not a fan, but that organ sure sounds nasty, so ok. TRACK TWENTY-TWO - Great section playing! Not a particularly great chart, but oh well. Oh, Phil woods, no wonder the sax section sounds so damn good. He's one of the great lead altoists in the history of big band music. Clark Terry too. Oh really now... Geez, those guys made so many dates, some great, some average. This one sounds like an average one, but you get players like this and they can create the impression of great writing where merely good exists, and this is such a case. Kudos to professionalism! TRACK TWENTY-THREE - Wasn't this on your last BFT? Or was that Big Al's? Whatever I said then, I repeat now. Hey, Ben Webster, and all that implies. TRACK TWENTY-FOUR - Son of "Odd Couple"? Good writing, good playing. Some of those voicings would go reaaaaaaaly bad if not played just so. Is that Jimmy smith? Yeah, I know, this is an organ board and I could get banned for not knowing, but them's the chances you take in today's fast-pased world of diesel mechanics... Not a bad cut, probably a 45 done for airplay back in the day. Works for me as such. BONUS TRACK - Oh GOD, this is GREAT! Is this Cozy Cole from the "Topsy" sessions or thereabouts? YEAH! That is such a goofyass nuttygroove, and they play the shit out of it! Grooves like a MO-fukkin-FO! I can see a shimmy dancer driving horny men (and horny women) crazy over this thing, and I can see a whole lot more, only some of which involves sexual arousal (but the stuff that doesn't is a lot more weird than the stuff that does, trust me...). That guitar player probably didn't ever fuck anybody who disn't fall in live with them for life by the time it was over. When I die, I will be happy and feel blessed that I got to hear (and now, have) this cut. What more can you ask for out of a piece of music. Thanks, Vint!

I'm wondering if that's the arrangement that Geral did for Duke in its original form and the one that Duke recorded had been edited for the band by Duke or somebody else, or if Gerald took the arrangement he did for Duke & rewrote it for his band.

This is the first year I can remember that we have not been solicited for cookie sales at home, work, or anywhere. Didn't realize they were out until we saw the girls seeling them form tables at the grocerie stores, etc. WTF?

The opening part of the YouTube video where Braxton describes the theory of GTM (getting away from sonata form, infinite options of free-association, building music of erector set components, etc.) makes it sound like he's a top-level house DJ putting together a non-stop club mix. I've heard more than a few such things about which you could say the exact same things. Hold your fire . I know full well the difference. But if we're looking at music in terms of defining individual and/or "new" thought processes, definitions of time/space/place etc., then the parallel is striking, and certainly food for thought on a macrosocial plane. The "differences" are there, and real, but so are the "similarities". Nothing exists in a vacuum.

To repeat - Griff & Lock is included as 1/2 of Blues Up and Down. It's not jsut the solos on that one that make it my favorite. It's the way the heads get played. Possibly the tightest and most idyosyncratic of such of the lot, and that makes a big difference to me. Carpe diem.

let's see if this draws him out of hiding... JOE MCPHEE SUCKS!!!