DrJ

Soul Stream is right (thanks for clarifying), as I go back to the Mosaic booklet, the latest photo is from UNITY sessions...but it feels "later" because of the style of clothes/hair Young is wearing, that was what I "remembered." Even though that particular photo is not very well-done, what I was trying to say was that type of look would have fit the music a bit better IMHO. There HAVE to be some even later Larry Young photos out there somewhere...

It appears I'm in the minority here, but I like the cover for MOTHER SHIP OK. Although some of the slightly later vintage Larry Young pics (like those in the Mosaic booklet) would probably have fit the music a little better. Still, a nice job.

GREAT album, that NOTHING BUT THE BLUES!

I dig 'em a lot, although I wouldn't say I'm a rabid fan. Undeniable skills and great music, but I find a little goes a fairly long way for me. My wife and I pretty much always have the (and I hate this moniker) "R&B and Old School" stations on the car radio when we're driving any distance together - IMHO, THE BEST driving music ever is nowadays categorized within this genre - and of course TOP is featured prominently in many of these playlists. Like Jim R and some others (Hey, I remember Marine World - Africa/USA! I think it's in Vallejo now and is just called Marine World, right?) TOP are also a part of my growing up experience, since I lived in the South Bay. Hard for me to hear them and not be immediately transported back to my formative years (the "junior high school gymnasium dance flashbacks are the worst...).

This strikes me as one of those lineups that could sound either great or really not very good, depending on the day. I am not a big Patitucci fan, and Scofield has been hot and cold for me over the past decade. But it sounds promising, nonetheless - let's hope they deliver the goods!

I haven't counted them, but I have the whole series up through the ones just released in August and Sept, and I have picked up 4 of those so far. Will eventually get them all. The majority were upgrades from crappy late 80's jobs by McMaster and some others. So what's not to like? Cheap, nearly always improved sound over other U.S. (and to my ears many Japanese) editions, and uniformly great music. One of the best bargains in jazz reissues.

What could I possibly add at this point, other than to say goodbye Johnny, you're gone but won't be forgotten.

Sorry, jazzdog, I'm definitely with Lon and Shrdlu and a whole lot of others on this one. If the music was recorded well to begin with, then it deserves to be reproduced in the best possible sound. Blue Note material generally fits that bill, now don't it? RVG did some truly GREAT recordings for the time. To have them reduced to trebly, hissy crap (at times...not all McMasters sound that bad, but even his best have typically not approached the quality of Addy's work) does a disservice to the music, the musicians, and Rudy. Addy, on the other hand, does incredible work - you probably don't listen to much pre-bop jazz, but his work on some really horrendous source material, such as some of the High Note label reissues of live tapes from the 40's (e.g. Art Tatum), is nothing short of amazing. With good source tapes (check out the recent Basie Roulette CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD reissue) he's un-freaking-believably good at bringing out the best in the music. That album sets a standard for 50's era big band remastering, as far as I'm concerned, just amazing. Nothing McMaster has ever done comes even close. So sure, we all get it, we know there are many lousy sounding recordings that are wonderful musically (witness much of early Bird), but when they were great recordings 40 or 50 years ago I expect them to STILL sound like great recordings today. And as Lon points out, this all assumes you have a decent enough stereo set up to notice the difference (doesn't have to be expensive, just good).

Just wanted to chime in on this issue of marketing ploys/"getting" people to rebuy things...it's a non-issue as far as I'm concerned, for these reasons: 1. Not everyone wants the whole enchilada. Some people will be more than happy with the single disc of the Mulligan material issued by Verve. Others will want the box. A few of us fanatics bought the single disc and will trade it in for the box. So yeah, I bought the single Mulligan CD a while ago and now the Mosaic has been announced. Where's the harm? I've been enjoying the single disc for well over a year, listening on multiple occasionas. That's easily worth the 15 or so bucks I spent on it (you spend twice that much going to see a live performance that's over in 2 hours and never think twice about it!). Not to mention that I'll trade it in at a used place and get some of my money back. 2. Some people prefer original LP art and format to boxes. I've never really understood that, except in a very few cases of albums that are nigh on perfect, but go figure - everyone is different. So again, where's the harm in having some material available in both formats? 3. I don't know that we can assume any reissue program is cynically designed, I think as others point out above there is probably a lot of developments after reissues hit the market that dictate some of the "duplications." For example, Mosaic finally getting a licensing deal for the Mulligan material when they likely did not have it back when the single CD was issued. And again, even if they DID have the license back then, see numbers 1, 2, and 4. 4. If you don't want to rebuy material, well, don't rebuy the material. If you're up for it, then go for it. It's that simple. As far as I know, Universal et al have not begun holding hand guns to people's heads requiring they buy their umpteenth copy of LOVE SUPREME or any other title. The complaints about redundant reissues really reflect the obsessive collector inside, I am afraid. If you chafe at the idea of rebuys, well, then just say no! Many of us would prefer to have multiple chances and formats to choose from, an embarrassment of reissue riches so to speak, than to have various outfits acting in perfect lockstep with their reissue programs.

I don't agree with a lot of Bev's take on Organissimo (the in club thing especially - seems pretty open to me) - which is OK, we can agree to disagree, I respect the viewpoint. But I do agree about the dominance of American jazz issue he raises...that was one of my main points in featuring mostly non-American artists in the first blindfold test. "America-centric" was the way I put it, and I think it extends far beyond this board. The more I explore musicians from other parts of the world, the more I realize how much we're all missing by focusing so much on American artists. I think it's healthy to get tweaked by folks from other parts of the world on this once in a while, as Bev is doing with his usual fairhandedness and civility.

Hey, CONGRATULATIONS! As the father of a 2 month old boy (our first child), I can tell you that while it is a little scary at times, and you know that the real worries don't even start until later, it's also the greatest feeling in the world to be a daddy. Nothing quite like it; nothing else is even close.

Yeah, Oscar's persona kinda bugs me, but sorry folks, Mosley is going down...

Cool! I don't have this and haven't heard any of the music, but have been meaning to check it out...hope I can get it in time to join the major discussion.

Duh! I knew about that Columbia cover, but had forgotten. It's MUCH better than the Philips watercolor, you're correct! Oh well, the paper sleeve edition sounds great anyway... Jim, I see the Jazz in Paris CDs at most Tower stores for about $10, and you can usually find them through Dusty Groove or, if all else fails, might try Amazon France.

Glad you enjoyed it, Mike! LEGRAND JAZZ is available on CD...although a bit tricky to find. I used to have a version from Philips in Germany, and that one I see pop up at places like Borders fairly frequently. The sound is pretty good, not great. I upgraded to a Japanese 24-bit paper sleeve edition last year (which has the original cover art; the German edition does not), and I think that one can still probably be found. But then again I love this album, finding the arrangments clever without being overly cute and the playing to be top notch throughout (other tracks feature different all-star configurations including Ben Webster on some).

OK, the mono version number is WL 162. Here's the lineup: From the U.S.: Clark Terry, Ben Webster, JJ Johnson, Hank Jones, Kenny Burrell, Jo Jones, and George Duvivier From France: Grappelli, Solal, Roger Guerin (trumpet) From the UK: George Chisholm (trombone), Bob Garcia (tenor sax), Roy East (alto sax), Ronnie Ross (piano) From Sweden: Ake Persson (trombone) Listening in the car again this morning, I have to say this is a fun record. There is some prime JJ and Webster, that was reinforced - if you're a fan of Webster's ballad artistry, for example, there's a killer reading of "Misty." I wish I had found this record soon enough to have included a track on my blindfold test CD, it would have fit the theme perfectly! I doubt we'll see a reissue of this album by Columbia/Legacy anytime...if Mosaic ever gets around to doing a various artists COLUMBIA JAZZ SESSIONS box, similar to the CAPITOL JAZZ box they did that rescued so much valuable material from American Reissue Purgatory, it would be a nice thing to include.

Just arrived last night, minor wear on the outside box but otherwise in great shape. Only had a chance to do a quick A/B comparison of remastering quality between the material I did have in more recent Verve Master Editions (BIRD & DIZ and CHARLIE PARKER) and the boxed set remasterings of the same material. I have to say, I don't hear much difference between the two versions at all; perhaps a slight advantage for the later remasterings in the dynamic range and presence of the bass. These were never great recordings sonically, but unlike the magic RVG has been working with the early 1950's Doug Hawkins BN recordings (e.g. Monk GENIUS OF MODERN MUSIC), Verve haven't done much to make this Parker material sound better on their Master Editions. The music, of course, speaks for itself.

I just tried to send a PM and it's still not working - figured I'd mention it since it's now Sept 10 and I figure the updates are probably complete.

This is one of those albums that strikes me as one where all the planets were in alignment and it was predestined it would be a classic. It just all sounds so fresh and full of new things yet also so logical and tidy...and you know that much of it happened on the spur of the moment and WASN'T worked out ahead so it's all the more amazing. An analogy in this realm would be OUT TO LUNCH, another recording of very demanding and, for the time, avant garde music that sounds so "right" that it seems like probably that music has been floating around the universe since the beginning of time and Dolphy and Co. just "channelled" it on that fortuitious session. Same with FOUR FOR TRANE. More specifically: I love Shepp's tone here, and Rudd's, and the way they blend (one of THE great pairings in jazz history IMHO), and Moffett's unconventional pulse. I enjoy all of Shepp's Impulse! recordings immensely, they're full of daring, interesting, challenging, and enjoyable music. But I have to say, when viewed from a 2003 vantage point, except for FOUR FOR TRANE, they all sport significant flaws - sometimes it's self-indulgance, with track lengths longer than the improvisations really merit, sometimes it's overdone political stridency, sometimes it's ill-conceived arrangements. None of this is to say that these aren't all fascinating creations, and in fact on some days the flaws make them even more interesting and unsettling (not a bad thing), but still the flaws have to be acknowledged. FOUR FOR TRANE has none. I seldom find Shepp's more extended length pieces hold my interest the whole way through...to me, it sounded like he was catering to the tastes of the day (or maybe pleasing his sidemen) with these long tracks, when his true inclination was to be much more concise. With his widely-acknowledged roots in Ben Webster and swing as much as in bop and Coltrane, this proclivity wouldn't surprise me one bit. So on FOUR FOR TRANE, the greatest virtue missing from much of his other work of the time, IMHO, is judicious editing, not in the literal, tape-splicing sense but in the mental sense. So for me, I don't think Shepp ever approached the level of artistry that he attained with this first Impulse! recording. FOUR FOR TRANE deserves to be included near the top of the list of truly essential jazz recordings of the 1960s.

Since the stupid Private Message deal doesn't seem to be working for me (again) this morning...wanted to make sure everyone saw this. Dmitry had accepted my nomination last week, but I haven't seen anything from him yet so wanted to make sure this reminder was posted. Dmitry, if you can't do it, please let us know ASAP. Thanks!

There's truth to this argument, but I think the counter argument is that sometimes it's really hard to keep track of all that's being posted in the larger forums, and I'd include recommendations as a larger one. I probably miss stuff all the time. Anyway, not married to the idea, just a thought. I do understand totally that it's a fine line between too many and too few forums and I'm no web administrator myself.

Anyone seen this LP, from Columbia, 1959 (I have the mono version, not sure of the number, stereo is on AMG as WS314)? It was an early experiment in overdubbing and assembling an album with the musicians on various continents, never having actually played together, spearheaded by Leonard Feather. JJ Johnson, Ben Webster, Grappelli, Solal, and a host of others from the U.S., UK, Sweden, and France. Some pretty hoary, well-worn tunes, but the playing is real good (there's some superb JJ and Webster). I can post other details later when home and the album's in front of me, but has anyone else enjoyed this one? Would be nice to see it reissued on CD some day.

Hey, I'm into ALL music formats, so it's not a "vinyl is best" kind of thing, audiophile focus I'm suggesting. Rather, there's a lot of good stuff that's ONLY available on vinyl, and rather than mixing discussion about it with other threads (e.g. Recommendations), maybe there's enough interest to support a "Vinyl Corner" or "Vinyl Freak" (a la the DOWNBEAT column) or some such separate forum. Has this been suggested already and I'm hopelessly out of date?

"When You and I Were Young, Maggie" and "You Brought a New Kind of Love" are the two tracks NOT on the American release ESSENTIAL VIC DICKENSON (1995) but that ARE on the Japanese 2 CD set. To make it more confusing, the slightly later Vanguard U.S. release of part of this material, NICE WORK (1999), mentioned above, DOES contain these two tracks but is missing some of the others on ESSENTIAL. SOOO...if you were inclined to get all the music and didn't mind the duplication of most of the tracks, you could buy both American partial issues (and probably for less than what it would cost for the Japanese 2 CD set, assuming you could find it...I got a lucky deal at Virgin Megastore in NYC but it's going on Amazon now for $40+ dollars).

Congratulations! It's a wonderful adventure.