JSngry

Syl Johnson. Better grab it now if you're going to grab it at all.

Longer than that, but not consecutive by a long shot. First leader dates were in 1947, last ones in 1964, but plenty of breaks in between.

I saw an interesting(enough) made-for-TV (CBS) movie called "Minstrel Man", starring Glenn Turman.

I kinda like this guy's writing, actually.

The Moserobie catalog is definitely worth exploring.

Do tell...please!

One never knows... But besides Cotton Watts (whose performance is as vile as it is brilliant, raising the question of can the two qualities ever be separated, and if not, then perhaps that is just who we are, so....sober up, America, this ain't no party...) there's Emmett Miller, Scatman Carouthers, and Brother Bones, and....if nothing else, you see some classic bits and jokes that no doubted pre-date vaudeville and that would be "funny" without all the trappings...yet it was the trappings that enabled them to be created in the first place, and to hang in there long enough to be released down stream. Turn me loose, White Man, indeed. Turn US loose, all of us. Speaking of Emmett Miller, this is a bit of a mind-blowing CD, nothing like I was expecting:

Jonas Kullhammar is somebody I've dug for a good bit now. And Moserobie is, I think, his own label. They have quite a good catalog, actually, although I don't know how much of it would be to your overall liking. But yeah, Jonas Kullhammar can play!

Next step on the same path, yes. Same root mentality, though, imo. Have you (or anybody else) seem Yes Sir, Mr. Bones? https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044222/ Clips are on YouTube, maybe even the whole thing. I'd post some here, but There are both black and blackface minstrels in the show, seriously virtuosic chops are on display by all, and ambiguity (intentionally and otherwise) is totally the order of the day within the context of the actual show. The scenes that open and close the movie, though. are stomach-turning, at best. Anybody who can answer all the questions it raises by the time it's over has a better grasp of humanity than I do. Suffice it to say that we dream (or once dreamt) of a "post-racial" America.. Well, good luck on that.

Dude - you have Eddie Johnson and Jonas Kullhammar on the same program. EX-cellent!

Or Colonel Tom's Elvis. Or Elvis himself, when you get right down to it.

I've not yet looked at the clip and/but am merely commenting on Allen's observations on it, which ring wholly true to me as a general cultural critique quite apart from any one specific source.

Overthinking it? Maybe it's thought just right. Rarer than the proverbial hen's teeth is the Caucasian-American Popular Musical Performer who at some point doesn't attempt to earn some/more/any vague-yet-understood "credibility" by referencing African-American expression, either overtly or indirectly, naturally or otherwise. And rarer still are the ones who do so and display some real empathy towards what it is that is being expressed. Especially in the post-Elvis error, white people seem to go out of their ways to prove that they're not "too/that white". But - how much whiter can you be than pretending that your whiteness can be wished away, how much of a superiority do you have to assume to think that that can be done? Or to not recognize that the need to wish that it could be is a surefire sign that something is wrong with this culture, something that is not recent, and something that may very well be built into its DNA? And if it IS in the cultural DNA, what is the best/most appropriate response for all involved? And is that best response going to be the most honest response? Overthinking it? Maybe it's thought just right.

At some point, yeah. At the risk of conjuring some kind of something, it seems to me that the older and heavier she got, the heavier her phrasing also got. Still an incredible instrument, yet, if there is such a thing as ponderous soaring, then that's where she went (and stayed). But jesus, earlier Sarah, that was a wonder - lithe, bouncy, all-knowing, not afraid of anything. A Michael Jordan-like freedom of singing. I can listen to that pretty much any time and get all kinds of happy. Oh yeah, the Decca sessions w/Larkins were produced by Milt Gabler, if I remember the liner notes correctly.

Let them decay first.

Stanley Crouch?

And then plant tomatoes.

And then go next door. The old neighbors would have just called the police on that, but this new guy got small kids and for all I know, he's actively exercising his 2nd Amendment rights. Not that that itself bothers me, so far he seems sane and stable, so it doesn't. But - that would be more questions than I'm in the mood to answer from anybody, especially law enforcement professionals.

And - they're not really Mosaic sets. They're CDs from Mosaic sets and should not be advertised otherwise.

Nor do I. At their age, one or all of them could drop dead all of a sudden, and damned if I want THATon the TV news!

Reading the liner notes has provided a little historical perspective, which I needed. apparently Ella had never been afforded the opportunity to record an "all standards" record before the Gershwin date, and it took five(?) years before another opportunity came along on Decca. After that, Norman Granz kindly did the needful and then she could record pretty much whatever she wanted. It sounds to me like she was a little self-conscious, perhaps even unsure on these dates, not sure how straight or how "jazzy" to sing them, or how to balance the elements. Or maybe she just hadn't fully grown into them yet. But Larkins is not a problem here. And the Gershwin songs are dorky, ultimately. They just are. They've got "coyness" built into them, musically and lyrically. Not to take away from the skill, but the coyness they display seems very dated to me, and not in a good way. Images of self-satisfied "first-nighters" congratulating themselves for how damn clever they all are...it gives me the creeps. Of all the famed/iconic writers of the "GAS", Gershwin has long paled before any of the others in my estimation. Don't gonna rgue with history as far as his "place", but history can go fuck itself as far as quality goes. Still, in the right hands... Put a top hat on THAT, motherfuckers.

Anything that heightens awareness of 19th Century American Mentalities is useful at this point in the 21st Century, imo.

Your purpose should simply be to conduct independent research in a non-profit setting for the purpose of gaining a greater macro-awareness of the outward impact of Louis Armstrong's contribution to global culture.

Stats and data are all good for what they are, but ultimately we all "hear" what we think we hear at any given time. Low grade example - how many times/years have any of us listened to a familiar "golden oldie" of any sort before hearing something that we've never heard before, some deeply buried interior part, some subtlety of voicing or of phrasing that we'd never noticed before? Well, it was always there, and a lot of times, it's not even a new mix or mastering that brings it out, t's just that our minds have for whatever reason cleared enough space to allow us to shift our perspective to a place that gives us room to add more information, information that was always there. Just saying, stats are good for what they are, and of course, when the difference gets big enough, the difference is obvious (so obvious that you don't really need stats, right?) but our bodies do not process stats. Stats are a trailing indicator of a real time event that happens on all sides, colored by our ability to "measure" in limited segments.. that's all they are.