T.D.

The initial post stipulated "...influential, landmark or special ensembles...", which might narrow the field somewhat.

The Teddy Charles Tentet is discussed at length in Cohen and Fitzgerald's Rat Race Blues: The Musical Life of Gigi Gryce. From pp. 191-194: The Teddy Charles Tentet was more than just a recording unit and the group played a landmark concert at New York's Cooper Union in the spring of 1956...Throughout 1956, the Tentet performed at various concerts including one on April 27 at a New York junior high school on 93rd Street where bass giant Charles Mingus was part of the ensemble...On Saturday afternoon, July 7, the Tentet made a high profile appearance at the Newport Jazz Festival along with the Phineas Newborn Quartet and Friedrich Gulda's ensemble. The concert was later broadcast on the Voice of America...Gryce and tubist Don Butterfield were the only holdovers from the January recording session...But despite critical acclaim for both its recordings and live performances, especially the Newport appearance, the band had little commercial potential. Charles rebuffed any attempts to broaden the ensemble's appeal and opportunities for appearances dried up. By 1957, the Tentet was history, only occasionally revived in the years to come.

Just noticed this is back at Dusty Groove. I listened to a couple of tunes on Youtube, thought they weren't that bad but am not going to pay $22.99 for a CD.

a) $19.99 b) no, afaict

Guy in a bar complaining to the bartender about his divorce. "Damn, my wife is taking me to the cleaners, her lawyer's really a f**g asshole". Bartender says "Yeah, I hear you...all lawyers are assholes". Drunk sleeping at the end of the bar wakes up, lifts his head off the bar and shouts "Hey, I resent that!" Bartender says "What are you, a lawyer or something?" Drunk says "No, I'm an asshole."

Leaning against it. Excellent project, credit to Mosaic Lotta material that attracts, but vocals appeal less and the sticker price is significant. Will preorder for the discount if I go for it, but that'll be a decision for late May.

Thanks, interesting story. The 6th paragraph may provide a clue about the guitar seller's identity. I'm thinking the dentist who had Ribbecke build it. Or his heirs...

Thanks. Won't be getting any of my cash.

I just noticed on Bandcamp ( https://deathisnot.bandcamp.com/ ) a 3-part series I Had the Craziest Dream: Modern Jazz and Hard-Bop in Post War London, Vol. 1, 2, 3. Time frame late 1940s through early 1960s. Looks really interesting but a little earlier than my main period of interest.

Doesn't look like it. Advertised as "mint", looks newish and practically unused, apparently produced by an artisanal luthier (searching for correct words here...) Price is incomprehensible to me, but I reckon the market will decide.

You mentioned this (bolded) once before. Cleared up a big mystery. I'd been curious about the many Allmusic reviews with three stars but glowing laudatory text.

After reading recent posts in the audio thread, I found this loudspeaker at a mere $685,000 per pair... https://hifiplus.com/articles/wilson-audio-wamm-master-chronosonic-loudspeaker/ I doubt that Best Buy sells it.

Damn, I forgot to mention that one. Awesome, and by chance the first Waldron-led recording I bought. I could imagine a recording drought from roughly 1963-66 due to breakdown / OD and recovery. Could have had some problems before the breakdown. Maybe the move to Europe in '65 also slowed things down.

Back to the original post...I like Mal, but am not so much into his early "purely hard bop" recordings. I much more often reach for his, so to speak, more outside or post-bop recordings. For instance, the aforementioned Five Spot with Dolphy (despite out of tune piano), Seagulls of Kristiansund, duets with Steve Lacy such as Sempre Amore, etc. Granted I don't expect those are much to Peter's (original poster's) taste. OTOH, there are later straight-ahead Mal recordings that I also like a lot. So maybe I just prefer his later playing.

Strong +1 on Blues for Bud, which has some perceptible Tyner influence. My favorite and most played Hawes album, and I own quite a few (though sadly not Hamp's Piano).

Likely to pass.

Is that the autobiography ghosted by Quincy Troupe? I really enjoyed that book. It's been justly criticized on some scores (iirc a certain amount of factual info was cribbed from Jack Chambers's work), but the Troupe volume vividly conveys Miles's voice and personality. Miles comes across as rather abrasive (stronger terms could be used ) at times, but I appreciated the book pulling no punches. Disclosure: I have not read Troupe's later book Miles and Me.

I buy a lot from discogs. Have taken a strong dislike to Amazon (their absurdly garbled classical database basically says "Fuck you" to customers), and the signal / noise ratio of eBay price listings is not good. But I only buy CDs, so have fewer potential grading and shipping issues. Only have had one subpar buying experience on discogs. A really cheap classical box set (Holmboe complete string quartets on Da Capo) turned out to be lacking the booklet. I thought it could have been an honest mistake, and the set's not exactly a cornerstone of my collection, so let it slide.

Dusty Groove order, mainly filling holes in the Tapscott collection (they stock a lot of Nimbus West releases):

Yes, I'm happy with it. Purchased with practically zero foreknowledge, but have really enjoyed it and listened to the whole box through several times. I opted for Nucleus's 6-CD Torrid Zone box on Esoteric (instead of the BBC set), and that was probably my favorite 2021 purchase. Would like to hear the BBC set, but doubt that I'll make the significant expenditure...

Yes, there have been some outstanding Ra LP-sourced reissues. But I had a less-than-great experience with Corbett vs. Dempsey's reissue of Ra's Continuation: CD 2 had crappy sound quality, apparently much worse than on the Bandcamp Vol. 2. When DG announces arrival, I guess I'll make a split-second decision on whether to roll the dice.

Excellent point. Based on posts above, I assume a needle drop. But I don't know where / how to confirm, and am too lazy to attempt e-mailing an unfamiliar Japanese record company.