T.D.

Those are tough to beat. In the honorable mention category: I watched him play @ Wrigley Field several times...I question the surname prefix: surely it should be "Le", not "La"... Pete often figured in trivia questions, as his father Peter Marshall was host of the "Hollywood Squares" TV game show. Actress Joanne Dru was his aunt (I'd forgotten that - just reminded via Wiki). BTW, I saw Rusty K. play @ Comiskey Park.

Etchebarren was known as one of the least handsome big leaguers. Speaking of which, I recall the Joe Torre dig from (the late) Jim Bouton's Ball Four...the best quote I can find on the Internet goes: “Jim Pagliaroni joined the club tonight and is going to be a welcome addition. He was describing a girl that one of the ballplayers had been out with and said, 'It’s hard to say exactly what she looked like. She was kind of Joe Torre with tits.' This joke can only be explained with a picture of Joe Torre. But I’m not sure any exist. He dissolves* camera lenses.” * I recall the term as "melts", but haven't looked at the book in years and could be mistaken.

Please post impressions. As mentioned in some other thread, I've effectively read several excerpts from the book (Gann posted them, or talks based on book excerpts, etc. over the years). Not sure I'm a big enough Cageian to justify purchase, and it's not available on my interlibrary loan network (only Gann work thereon is American Music in the 20th Century).

+1. Liked him in general, esp. in BR.

Starting in the "middle" of the box, CD 3-5.

The bar was set pretty low in the USA in '60s and '70s. I even remember trying the British import Watney's back in the mid-'70s and thinking it was good...years later I found that it had a nickname something like "piss" (forget the details).

Well, kinda...All three commodities have become, thank goodness, more "artisanal" in recent decades. Beer - can't speak to the '60s, but in the '70s various (mostly regional) beers were considerably less urinous than the American norm. On the national level, Michelob (a "premium" brand) was fairly tasty. Likewise IMO Stroh's (Michigan) and F X Matt (NY State, I think they still brew some prestigious names under contract). I'm sure others could cite examples from their regions. In the '70s, Coors (when regional to CO) was the "hippest" beer, often mentioned by rock stars, but I found it watery and never cared for it. Labatt's and Molson (Canada) were always worth paying up for relative to standard American crap.

I grew up in the Chicago area, and Schlitz was really big in Chi-town. Tasted like Scheisse but was cheap. I recall lots of bars in the 60s and 70s having Schlitz neon signs in the window.

Lettering looks a lot like Schlitz.

Yes. I enjoy it too. One-offs?

No, the link I found was https://fr.shopping.rakuten.com/ It was one of the hits when I googled the French title of a box set. [Added] I see that in France, Rakuten was fka PriceMinister.com, which seems to have been fairly active and respected. But I never heard of it before.

I've found some French EMI items I was looking for at the French Rakuten site. Seller claims to be able to ship to USA. Any experience with Rakuten (especially USA customers)? New site to me. I have purchased from fnac and amazon.fr in the past.

Thanks, I already found that Google is the only way to locate this set (and some other products) at Amazon. Weirdly, though, when I click through to the sellers I'm back to the Bernard Roberts issue. I guess I'd have to ask a seller whether it's actually the Sherman set. The UPC code search is news to me.

Thanks again, will take into account. Adding to my frustration, Amazon's search engine has recently gone to hell. Search for Russell Sherman's cycle seems to redirect to one by Bernard Roberts, and the customer reviews thereof refer to several different sets (incl. Nat, Badura-Skoda)! Hard to trust them either. No wonder I've been going more to discogs or even eBay of late...

Deepak, Thanks very much! Sherman has been on my "radar" because it's been praised by some reviewers whose tastes seem kind of parallel to mine. I gave my father the Heidsieck set some years ago, but he apparently lent it out and never got it back. Now that he has Alzheimer's there's nothing to do in that connection. Re. Distler, his reviews show technical grasp, but he's trashed many recordings I like. I listen to a lot of modern-ish music, so some of it could be down to conservatism. I have a feeling that in core repertoire he'll basically repeat "received values" and never recommend anything off-the run. Heidsieck and Sherman are both sets I'd buy in a flash at "the right price". Heidsieck was included in an EMI 50-cd Beethoven super-budget box, but that's oop and now hard to find. Unfortunately, some Amazon offerings are by the notorious momox from Germany, who I'm reluctant to trust with a significant order.

I've seen a quote to that effect. Squares with my experience. I absolutely loved baseball up to the age of around 12. I played the game then, and the big leaguers seemed heroic and larger than life. I read all the historical accounts and knew oodles of statistics. It gradually faded - as I grew up I developed other interests, and it became clear that I'd never go anywhere as a player ... And I find that many retirees / seniors become big baseball fans and follow all their team's games. My father, for instance, who was not big into baseball until the age of 70 or so.

A few weeks ago, I saw in a Woodstock art gallery a copy of the original concert program: Note that (as pointed out by Kyle Gann in link below) they botched 4'33" in the program! Interesting transcript of a talk by Gann on 4'33" here. The link at the top of this thread cites Gann.

PM sent on Introducing Kenny Cox $10 (Reading Mark Stryker's new book in which this recording, previously unknown to me, was mentioned.)

Recent Steeplechase order:

Looks like "Woodstock 50" will not happen: https://hudsonvalleyone.com/2019/07/18/woodstock-50s-latest-setback/ Oddly, this story does not mention Oppenheimer, the presumed Wall St. saviors. But I always thought Michael Lang was blowing smoke.

I'm with "just enjoy the spectacle". I once went to a single-A (short season) game in the NY-Penn League and found it weird because the level of play was so much below major league. Many of the players were on their first pro contract, some probably using wood bats for the first time, and a lot of guys were having serious trouble hitting, even overmatched. Lake County is in the Midwest League (single-A full season), so the level will be slightly higher, but still not impressive. I had some fun playing make-believe scout and trying to judge which players had chances of advancing to the big leagues. The game I attended was extremely kid-friendly, with lots of mascot activity, music, free souvenirs being tossed into the stands, etc.

Haven't read it, but I expect so. When Gann was still active on the internet (used to blog, and his website when active was a big resource), I read several excerpts/drafts from the book in process, which he posted as written. I think Gann's one of the best commentators on contemporary music, though some might not agree with his advocacy of "totalism".