JSngry

Isn't that her on the cover?

I certainly appreciate the concept, but is it possible that the setup of individual threads inside seperate sub-forums inside a whole new category makes it more difficult to readily access/peruse information rather than easier?

http://www.dustygroove.com/videos.htm#426978 DVD -- Playboy After Dark (3DVD set) . . . DVD Morada Vision, 1959/1960/1969 (3DVD) Condition: New Copy The long-overdue release of one of the hippest TV shows ever -- the legendary Playboy After Dark, one of the most unusual musical shows ever broadcast! The format for the program was unique -- it took place as a live party at the Playboy Penthouse of Hugh Hefner -- a really mixed affair where artists of all styles, races, and political convictions would hang out together and rap about their work and a variety of topical issues. And sure, the whole thing was a bit staged, but it still managed to come off pretty great -- thanks to a particular talent on Hef's part for mixing together mainstream and underground, right wing and liberal -- all at a late 60s moment when intersecting lifestyles could clash as often as come together! 3DVD package features 4 shows from 1968 and 1969 -- plus 2 more from the earlier Playboy's Penthouse show at the end of the 50s -- a total of 6 episodes in all, filled with conversation and performances by Lenny Bruce, Sammy Davis Jr, Ike & Tina Turner, The Checkmates Ltd, Jerry Lewis, Mort Sahl, Vic Damone, Dick Shawn, Canned Heat, Sonny & Cher, Billy Eckstine, and Joe Cocker! I figure it's either a total mess, a kitsch classic, or an interesting window into a unique time in American pop culture history. Or all of the above. Anybody?

Dave Grusin Buzzy Drootin A Rootin' Tootin' Son Of A Gun

No, Blue Ballads isn't listed on AMG for some reason. But it's on the Japanese Venus label, and is a very worthy listen I think. I think that Cadence might carry it. Another really good one is Ginseng, a 1986 date made under the co-leadership of African pianist Tchangodei, about whom I know nothing other than that he plays really well. More info here: http://www.tchangodei.com/frameset-mus-gb.htm The side on Fluid w/Joe Lee Wilson is called A Touch Of The Blues, and to my knowledge has never been out on CD. Worth the hunt, but it'll probably be a long one... The Delmark side w/The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble is readily available, although I think it might be more readily appreciated by somebody who's followed Shepp's later years with interest rather than relative disinterest. All the Steeplechase duet sides w/Parlan are very much to my liking. Also on Steeplechase is another duet album, this time with Jasper Van't Hof, Mama Rose, that I've always been fond of. It's got both sythesizers & Shepp vocals, so be forewarned, but the music has always reached me. The duet sides w/Max Roach are truly essential latter-day Shepp, I think. The Long March on hat is the better known and more easily found, but another, significantly more obscure one, Force, on the Italian Base label, is the shit afaic. That bad boy is serious. But once again, good luck finding it... Of course, no Shepp collection is complete w/o his performance w/a then unknown Whitney houston on a Material side, but that's edging into, shall we say, "esoterica". Shepp's been such a whore about recording over the years (really, he was David Murray before David Murray was...) that you gotta wade through a whole lot of shit (ranging from merely mediocre to truly horrible) to find the good stuff, and quite often the good stuff is on little "rural" labels that came and went w/little more that a (hopefully) few coins for the players at the end of the session and a few LPs that made it out into the world for a few minutes. And other than the Steeplechase sides (with & w/o Parlan), I can't really say that any of Shepp's "high profile" (in terms of American distibution) dates have shown him at what I would consider his latter-day best. C'est la vie... As for the tenor thing, yeah - it's a very physically demanding instrument, especially if you approach it like Shepp does/did and use a wide open mouthpiece, the stiffest possible reed, and an embrochure that basically consists of frequently swallowing the mouthpiece, blowing as hard as you can, and letting your cheeks puff out to an extent that rivals Dizzy Gillespie's. That's what he needed to to to get that powerful sound of his, but you can only taunt nature for so long, if you know what I mean...

Jewel Grant Lou Grant Sue Ann Nivens

It's where JC Heard.

Owen Marshall, Counsellor at Law Marcus Welby, M.D. Richard Diamond, Private Detective

Just a little herb on a break. Nothing scandalous.

Fair enough, although I'd submit for consideration the thought that from their respective beginnings, Roscoe was first and foremost an explorer whose voice was the semi-secondary byproduct of his searching, that Shepp was first and foremost a voice whose innovations were the semi-secondary byproduct of his developing that voice, and that in that regard, things are still as they were at the beginning. As they almost inevitably are.

Larry Wrice Campbell Brown Maurice Sendak

Ooops, wrong thread. Sorry!

Dave Ed Bob

http://www.theslowskys.com/

Triple H The Doublemint Twins SWF

Jack Black Black Uhuru Jess Unruh

Mike Figg Prunella Scales Les Jazz Modes

Mr. Ed Wilbur Sweatman Sweet Sweetback

From as recent as 1999, there's the Delmark side he made w/The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble. He's obviously hampered by the embochure issues, but nevertheless works with and around them to deliver some deeply felt, highly focused playing. There ain't that much there, but what there is is serious. Yeah, he sounds like an old man. But hell - when you get right down to it, he always sounded like an old man, at least in spirit. Now that he's becoming one (69 as we speak), it seems all the more appropriate...

No, but saying that comes pretty close.... As for that "essential" compilation, I for one would leave room on it for "Blue In Green" from Blue Ballads, as well as a few Steeplechase duet things w/Parlan & a cut from a mid-70s album on Marge he did w/Joe Lee Wilson. In fact, I could easily make a full disc of "essential" post-60s Shepp, if one's intent ws to show him at the top of his form over the course of his career. I'll even say that no matter what the era, Shepp's been a wildly inconsistent player. Not all of the Impulse! work is gold by any stretch of the imagination. (And exactly what are we talking about anyway - the last ten years, or post-1960s? There's a huge difference, especially since he spent the better part of the mid-late 70s churning out album after album that documented his coming to grips with change playing. Those are for the most part some dire documents indeed, and it's not until later in the 70s, when he finally got over that hurdle, that things started to come back around. And then you got the embochure issues of the latter years which slowed him down both musically and professionally.) If you don't really care for most/all of his post-60s work, hey, no problem. To each their own. But to say that there's a lack of "passion" to even the best of it is, to me, to suggest a definition of "passion" that fits a preconceived notion, a notion that perhaps doesn't give waht I would consider to be the necessary consideration to all the various changes wrought by time. Because afaic, if Shepp was still playing in 2006 like he played in 1966, he'd sound really stupid. That was then, this is now. If 40 years of life doesn't do something to a man, hey, whazzup with that? And if you can't deal with those changes in a meaningful way and give their own validity, what good does it do to live that long? No, Shepp's inconsistency has been there from the git-go, and it'll most likely be there until the end. I'm not about to claim otherwise, nor am I going to defend all the lackluster, rambling work he's done (from any period). What I will claim is that when Shepp is on, he's capable of some deeply moving playing. That was true in 1966, and it's true in 2006, even if the "style" of playing now might bear but a superfical resemblence to that of then. Unless, of course, one chooses to define substance in terms of style, in whole or in part. That's one's perogative of course, but it's not something that I myself particularly care to do.

Sonny Liston Walter Piston Annie Sprinkle

Well yeah, "uneven" is putting it mildly. But recognizing that and making a blanket dismissal are two different things...

Frank Sutton Vince Carter Will Cordero