JSngry

WTF?????????????????????????????????????????????????????

IIRC, both Melvin Sparks & Leon Spencer came up through the Kashmere program in the 1960s. Also, it's my understanding that once the great Conrad Johnson retired (sometimes in the late 1970s, I beleive), that the program deteriorated rather rapidly, and the scholl now has just another "jazz band". The story here is not that a (then) all black Texas high school produced the greatest funk band ever, or some such rot, it's that a (then) all black Texas high school band under the direction of a savvy director with direct roots to the music of his community produced generation after generation of inspired musicians and music. This should be a role model for music educators worldwide into perpetuity, and it should be something that all parents and educators consider when evaluating their local schools and curriculum. After all, if the role of education and educators is to instill knowledge & confidence, inspire the imagination, fuel personal initiative, and create tangible skills that one can carry into adulthood, one need look no further than Conrad Johnson & Kashmere for a damn fine example of how to do it.

I swear that Cabell was on some multi-tenor Black Saint/Soul Note side but I can't remember what it was and can't find a reference to it. But I'll wager a good dollar or so that it's true. You know whose tone I hear in him on the Patton date? Bennie Maupin.

Some of it came out on a Mainstream LP called Yesterday or something like that.

I too saw them at Brownwood a few times. Definitely not a "pro" band by any realistic standard, but nevertheless an amazing outfit worthy of recognition. These cats came to play, and they brought their own light show and M.C. They were poised well beyond their years in terms of both musical ability and stage presence.

Hoppity Hooper Larry Hooper Joe Feeney

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence The Man I Shot In Reno Just To Watch Him Die Me, Whom It Wasn't Who Started That Old Crazy Asian War

You're welcome!

Marvin Cabell was young, raw, and sincere on this recording. I love what he plays and how he plays it, even if by "academic" standards it's flawed. Not my problem.

I've got one with the same contents but a different cover, w/photos instead of a "design". Maybe a different anniversary? I'll look it up when I get back home.

Dude - LTB & I have been to the brink more than once. Frighteningly close in fact, to the point where I was in tears huddled up in a puddle where nobody could see. Why & how we pulled back remains a mystery to me, so if you're looking for a "what could I have done differently?" kinda thing, I'm not the guy, and neither is she. What I can tell you with absolute certainty is that shit happens, and more often than not it hurts. There is no other explanation sometimes, and the only "advice" I can offer with any amount of self-respect is this - you know who you are, and you know what kind of a person you are. Never let life's nutkicks make you forget that, and never allow the things that go south in life become the things that you allow yourself to be defined by. I know you'd like some kind of "explanation", if for no other reason than to maybe gain some insight into how to keep the situation from repeating itself further on up the road. There may indeed be one that you're not getting, but then again, maybe not. Like I said, sometimes shit really does happen "just because". Ok, one more piece of advice from the heart - you don't have to forget, but you defiitely need to forgive at some point. Hanging on to pain and bitterness is a recipie for long-term emotional suicide. It ain't gonna happen all at once, obviously, but it does need to happen. I do know that the only reason that Brenda & I have managed to stay together after pulling back from the brink those times is that we've made concerted efforts to let go of the pain we've caused each other over the years. And yes, letting go is an ongoing process. One might even say that it's a life's work. But there it is. What I'm saying is that this unfortunate turn of events ain't gonna kill you unless you let it. But it ain't gonna make you stronger either unless you let it. I feel your pain, and wish that it wasn't happening. But since it is, all I can offer you is symapthy and the exhortation to keep your head to the sky, even if it means using a crowbar for support.

Rose Marie The Virgin Mary Virginia Dare

It's Clifford Scott on the original. Is Billy Butler still alive? You could ask him.

Didn't Jim Carey play Clark Cable?

Ima Hogg Porky Pig Carl (of Carl's Tasty Sausage in Whitwright, Tx)

Let me see if I got this straight - Sonny Stitt acted bad once, so his girlfriend threw him out and he had to live in a box for awhile, and now everybody's forgotten about it except Concord? That's one helluva story!

Somebody get me Jimmy Hamilton!

Euel Gibbons Joe Christmas Smokey Logg

Ella Guru Dinah Shore Big Joan

Exactly.

Leonard Chess Chubby Checker Fats Domino (Is Fontella a phony?)

The Man Who Invented The Zamboni Bony Maroni A Transparent Phony

This one arrived today and has been spun. The cut w/Pharoah is tough! On the whole, though, I wanted more than I got. Let's just say that the group's very real energy and enthusiasm are out of balance with their level of finesse. However.... I definitely feel the "tweaking" to which DG refers, and it's an intriguing thing. The drummer is probably my facorite player of the group, and he plays in such a way that the pulse ends up affecting my whole body rather than just my extremities, which is the case with the music on which this is modeled. It still swings, but with less of an emphasis on 2 & 4. There's a more equally distributedsense of pulse and momentum, and that, it seems to me, may well be directly traceable to the last 25-30 years of contemporary dance music. Is it a radical breakthrough? No, noy even slightly. The afore mentioned lack of finesse means that there's passages of genuine goodness mixed in with passages of heavy-handedness and clumsiness, and there seems to be no rhyme or reason as to which shows up when. But there is something different happening here, and it's something that I think is worth paying attention to, if only as a hint of future possibilities.

Digger Phelps Phelps Collins All the Colins whom have ever lived

I remember watching that show when it aired. Boy was I pissed.