Niko

from here, Isoardi's interview (Ray Vasquez is also discussed elsewhere there, he was Ortega's cousin) Ortega [...] you weren't supposed to record. See, there was a recording ban, but Mory Rappaport had a nonunion label or whatever it was, and we didn't care. We just wanted to play. Isoardi To record. Ortega We thought it was great to do a recording. So we did that one, "The Clutching Hand." On the other side was Walter Benton's tune called "Home Run." It was a blues in F. At that time Walter Benton had written an introduction like a whole tone scale. The introduction was— [sings part of introduction] And his cousin Jimmy O'Brien would play like an augmented eleventh chord on the piano. [sings] But, you know, we were pretty cool for our age. We were only teenagers, you know. But anyway, we did the record, which I still think I have a copy of at home. So that was my very first recording, and it was nonunion and the whole bit. I'd never done anything like that. Isoardi Did you ever have a chance to hear it on the radio? Ever get any airplay? Ortega Possibly. Possibly. They may have played it a little on the radio once or something. I don't know. But it was called Ray Vasquez and his Beboppers, and Ray wasn't even on it. He didn't play nothing. But he got the session. You know, he got the recording session. And we didn't get paid or anything; we just did it. It was called Ray Vasquez and his Beboppers. It didn't have any of the guys' names or anything. That's all it said, "Ray Vasquez and his Beboppers."

just had another look at my copy which is dedicated to Jimmy's memory - so I think "only Al" really is the more likely scenario...

that is quite remarkable - recorded July 2 and 3 and Jimmy died August 26... so precisely 40 years ago it must have been in the pressing plant...

Al Grey / Jimmy Forrest - O.D. (out 'dere) just playing this one and realized it fit the bill, recorded in July 1980, 8 weeks before Forrest's death... and it's a nice enough organ record... also apparently the last Don Patterson recording to appear during Patterson's lifetime (the John Simon album is from 1986 but apparently only released a decade later) and - if I can trust discogs - the last recorded appearance of drummer Charlie Rice who died in 2018 at the age of 98)

Not unhappy if you end up being right...

Over here, everybody I talk to has become very pessimistic about the possibility of herd immunity or a vaccine (due to the vanishing antibodies thing)

he's got a webpage... I'd say you are both right... http://armanratip.net/indexEN.html

the best thing about that second Grits album (Blues Tour) is the B side, a quartet (ts/g/b/d) with George Freeman...

I'm in team no - I'm not using Facebook, not gonna start any time soon, and I'm afraid it would suck even more energy out of this place... We know now (or can maybe agree) that Mike Weil would open a Facebook alternative in case this place goes down... having that information is sufficient, we can all befriend him on FB when the time comes... until then I would recommend to do nothing.

more than one! There are japanese reissues that look like the original album, there is the "1954 Paris Sessions" Vogue CD which has the whole session (and also a Roy Haynes Session with Barney Wilen) and there is also a Rene Thomas compilation which has five of the seven tracks

they don't have much but some of it is quite amazing: https://www.sonuma.be/thesaurus/matiere-musique_jazz

posted this link a while ago, you can watch the whole (?) video on the official site of Belgian TV https://www.sonuma.be/archive/concert-de-art-blakey-et-ses-new-jazzmen

The festival has always been during the pentecost weekend so August seems unlikely...

Thanks!

no, we don't - there is a jazz drummer named Billy Wiggins, but his short list of credits starts a bit later while Billy Higgins in California in 1959 or so does make sense - so maybe it is Smilin Billy after all...

the thing about the Feuer album is that his thick, over the top and completely unneccessary organ playing completely ruins what could otherwise be a splendid album... the giant cheese on the cover is a good analogy... I also like how he assembled this group of legendary jazz players and then found someone who was really namend "Billy Wiggins" for the drum chair - so that everybody would think it's a typo

Thanks for writing! Looking forward to this! Thanks for writing! Looking forward to this! Thanks for writing! Looking forward to this!

I am wondering what those two Amy sessions are... "Sunrise, Sunset" appears on that tape, on the album and on additional singles, leaving relatively little room for additional sessions... There is Bongo Blue / Theme from Hot September which sounds better than Sunrise, Sunset and does come from a different session... Still I am puzzled: The lineup I posted above, is that in Lord? Are they maybe only responsible for part of the album?

The lineup for the Amy album from here certainly looks good and doesn't include Randi: Curtis Amy soprano and tenor saxophones Warren Gale, Jr. trumpet Lester Robertson trombone Horace Tapscott piano Eddie Mathias bass Mel Lee drums Onzy Matthews arranger but the clips don't sound like what one might hope (this track seems to be on both LPs and on a 45...) no clue about the lineups for the Randi tracks - they might well include Amy, why not...

I stumbled upon that LP on discogs recently when I looked into the origins of that great Lee Katzman album with Jack Wilson and Teddy Edwards... apparently Toots Camarata started two labels in the mid-60s, Coliseum and Palomar, produced a few sessions and albums but didn't quite live up to his original ambition... there's the Curtis Amy album on Palomar some of which I've heard and didn't particularly like, I'd call it overproduced and would expect more of the same on the Randi Amy LP.... there's on overlap in tracks between this LP and the Amy LP (e.g. Sunrise Sunset) so I'd guess this record is a compilation, especially given that Randi also recorded several times for Coliseum and Palomar (with more overlap in tracks e.g. Baby Elephant Walk) ... the Katzman album is a fairly straight Hard Bop session which I guess is the reason why it stayed in the can... https://www.discogs.com/label/300238-Coliseum-3 https://www.discogs.com/label/132500-Palomar

https://www.sonuma.be/archive/concert-de-art-blakey-et-ses-new-jazzmen Art Blakey with Freddie Hubbard, Nathan Davis, Jaki Byard and Reggie Workman live in Paris 1965

Some releases still came out after that, e.g. the Dodo Marmarosa double CD... but I guess there'll be a limit to how many projects can and will be completed

played this several times over the day, for me it's quite an amazing find... a classical Hard Bop session that almost nobody played in its first few years on spotify and youtube... imho it can really compete with similar albums from that period like those from the Carmell Jones Select... hard to go wrong with Teddy Edwards, Jack Wilson and Leroy Vinegar in 1963 I gues

Seems the session never came out there but since a few years it's up on spotify, apparently self-produced and imho it's every bit as good as one might have hoped edit: it's not just on spotify, also on youtube, most of it at least

thinking a bit more simplistic - isn't he violating the "no politics" rule?