mhatta

I love San Francisco, but the production seems to have been a bit sloppy. The song titles were completely messed up -- originally the first tune was labeled as "A Night in Barcelona" (actually it is "Goin' Down South") and the second was "Goin' Down South" (the real title is "Prints Tie"), etc.. Also, even though I am not familiar with the oeuvre of Joe Sample, I doubt the title of the third tune is really "Jazz" -- maybe it was a working title?

RIP. Barry visited Japan several times until recently and played and taught, always great. "Live at Dug" (a live recording at a Jazz café in Tokyo) is one of my favorites, even it had a not-so-good drummer. I don't think it's wrong to call Barry Harris a follower (or even copycat) of Bud Powell, but it's interesting that Barry doesn't sound like Bud (and Bud doesn't sound like Barry, either); Barry owes a lot to Bud stylistically, but always sounded authentic and original. For me, this is one of the mysteries of jazz.

Damn, isn't it an April Fool joke? I feel I'm doubly fooled. Anywise, I believe that we'll soon observe a plethora of "new" recordings from dead masters thanks to shiny AI/machine learning technology. I miss those days when Natalie & Nat King Cole duet was the thing. I also should say that Kenny G (and his marketing team) is a kind of genius...not so many people can raise hell and grab attentions this way.

My favorites not mentioned yet are: Inner Fires (1953, I think its intensity and sound quality beats the Birdland airchecks) Swingin' With Bud (1957, I think it's much better than its companion Strictly Powell) A Portrait of Thelonious (1962, unstable but swinging Bud with the three bosses -- Kenny Clarke and Pierre Michelot) At The Golden Circle Vol. 3 (1962, contains possibly the best version of I Remember Clifford, Bud's tribute to Brownie (and possibly Richie, his brother killed with Brownie in a car accident).

I'm still listening to Honkers & Screamers... This is the worst CD jacket I know of, but music is good. Mostly from the Vee-Jay vault. Including Julian Dash, David Shipp Combo (incl. the legendary Porter Kilbert and the young Andrew Hill), Tommy Dean, Wardell Gray, Big Jay McNeely, Al Smith, Arnett Cobb and Nobel "Thin Man" Watts. This one contains the music of Warren Lucky, Al King, Frank "Floorshow" Culley and Buddy Tate.

Long time ago I heard Sue Mingus and her Revenge Records was planning to release this Ronnie Scott's recordings, but after all they didn't. The 3-CD bootleg has been circulated since then. Not bad, the sound quality is ok (some dropouts and clumsy edits are audible, I hope they fix them), sometimes exciting, but I think most of tunes are just too long (33 min of Orange Was The Color, 31 min of Mindreaders and 35min of Faubus, etc.) And Jon Faddis is blowing rather aimlessly as usual. Mindreaders In Milano (aka My Music Emission, I don't know which one is the correct title, I hope liner notes shed some light) is a small suite, a nice addition to the Mingus oeuvre, but I think the most memorable version of this tune is played by the (original) Mingus Big Band at Village Vanguard in Apr. 1972. In both occasion Jon Foster shines. Chateauvallon 1972 is an interesting document. Fable of Faubus played in a quartet setting is quite refreshing.

Somehow I'm in the middle of Honkers & Screamers craze again, and listening to several old compilation CDs. This one contains the music of Red Prysock, Charlie Singleton, Morris Lane, Red Holloway, Big Jay McNeely, Julian Dash, Noble Watts and King Curtis. And cool jacket! This one contains the music of Chuck Higgins, Joe Houston, Lorenzo Holden, Roy Milton, Jack McVea, Floyd Turnham, Jonesy Combo(?), Brother Woodman(?) and Jake Porter. Most of them are west coast-based I guess.

My audiophile friends praised highly about Marantz M-CR612. Seems it is sold as Melody X outside Japan? Not so expensive, small footprint, great connectivity, etc. You still need speakers. https://www.whathifi.com/reviews/marantz-melody-x I should say that I usually listen to awful sounding airchecks from Cafe Bohemia in the 50s or such, so I am no audiophile at all. These days I usually listen to CD-ripped MP3s or streaming music via Bluetooth. Olasonic IA-BT7 is a crazy Bluetooth (and 3.5mm input) powered speaker I use. I think sometimes its sound quality beats more expensive pure audio equipment. But I'm not sure you can buy it outside Japan (I can't find reviews in English). https://www.olasonic.jp/product/?id=1526269723-648034

Oh, I forgot to mention this one...Dakota is great, but the very best Houston Person can be heard on this album.

I tend to think the sound of the 80s Soul Jazz revival is a bit too "healthy", or not greasy enough for me, but still cherish some of them: Swedish Lullaby / Richard Groove Holmes (1984) Steppin' Up / Hank Crawford & Jimmy McGriff (1987) Mean Streets No Bridges / Jimmy Ponder (1987) and other Muse recordings Front Burner / Charles Earland (1988) and other Muse recordings Out Of Nowhere / Snooks Eaglin (1989) well, kinda honorable mention...

With regard to the 80s Jazz, Sting comes to mind. Now it's almost forgotten and I guess many of you might disagree anyway, but I think Branford Marsalis and especially Kenny Kirkland's best work is heard in Sting's Bring On The Night (1986).

I don't usually rate Scott Hamilton highly, but Soft Lights & Sweet Music is my favorite Mulligan in his later years. Also, a guest appearance on Mel Tome's live recording is nice. Unfortunately, a US version of CD omitted a terrific medley of three Mulligan compositions (Line for Lions / Venus De Milo / Walking Shoes) with Mel's great scat. A Japanese 2 CD version contains all of them.

I'm not sure they are really "legitimate" (well, in the good ol' days some Japanese record companies distributed Italian Joker LP/CDs as "legit"...) but AFAIK the recent Freedom releases were produced by a company called MUZAK. It was established in 2003 and already did lots of Jazz reissues (including Julius Hemphill's Dogon A.D. CD). Even if you can't read Japanese, their webpage will give you some idea: http://www.muzak.co.jp/

Good for you, I've never seen both in person... Berndt Egerbladh is not well known outside his native Sweden, but a fine pianist.

I thought Wild Bill Moore's heyday was '40s (and some studio work such as Marvin Gaye's What's Going On), but he made 2 Jazz records in 1961 and they are not bad. He plays Sister Caroline, a Nat Adderley tune! Big Jay McNeely is sometimes despised as a mere honker & screamer, but actually he was an able Jazz tenor saxophonist. His rendition of How High The Moon is elegant and soulful.

Once famous (stint with Bird, Blue Train, tons of trio stuff from Japanese Alpha, etc.), so not really overlooked, but these days people rarely talk about Kenny Drew. And also about his son, Drew Jr., too. I think they should be remembered. This album is a classic, and possibly one of the best version of "Caravan" Jazz ever produced. I think Drew Jr. lacked originality a bit, but he was still very good at interpreting other Jazz greats' works. His rendition of Mingus/Monk tunes is impeccable.

Today I re-listened to Kenny Drew. Drew (& Jr. too) are now kinda forgotten, that's unfortunate. They are terrific pianists. This one is from '70s with awful jacket, so rightfully overlooked. That's also unfortunate, too.

Seems nobody has mentioned Freddie Mitchell yet. I think he was a great R&B saxophonist. A nice bio: https://www.spontaneouslunacy.net/artists-freddie-mitchell/

The King years of Bostic is good, but I think as an alto screamer Bostic shined most when he was in Lionel Hampton's band.

RIP Dr. Lonnie Smith. I really love his slow-to-medium groove like this.

It is a terrible news. RIP. The Good Doctor visited Japan several times and I could catch some. I heard that he really loves Japanese "Mugi Choco" (chocolate-coated wheat puff, cheap but good stuff). Hope he can get tons of them up there. My favorite in his later years:

The premature death of Emily Remler is still sorely missed.

I recently found that Mike Wofford is an overlooked but great pianist. This one is little known since it is a live recording in Japan and billed as "The Shelly Manne Trio". Playing "Nardis" for (the recently deceased at that time) Bill Evans with Manne is a dauntless task...

Lovano recorded some materials from BotC in 2006. I should say it is rather mundane despite the promising personnel. Also, I don't quite understand (now and then) why Lovano "has to" do it -- well, maybe he just "wanted to" or "could" do, but I don't see any personal connection or necessity. I'm not sure this was related with Gerry's 1992 project, but this Lee Konitz's recollection (from Bill Crow's Jazz Anecdotes) is rather amusing: The Smithsonian Institution wanted Lee Konitz to do a concert using the Nonet arrangements by Gil Evans, Gerry Mulligan, John Lewis, and John Carisi that had been used on the Miles Davis "Birth of the Cool" band in the late 1940s. Lee said: I didn't know where the arrangements were, so I called Miles. I hadn't had any communication with him in years, and he wasn't interested. He didn't want to hear about it. After getting the four arrangers to laboriously re-create their arrangements, Konitz phoned Davis: I said, "Miles, remember my asking you for the arrangements of the 'Cool' sessions? Well, we've transcribed them and rewritten them and put them together again." He said, "Man, you should have asked me. Those mothers are all in my basement." Later, Konitz reported the conversation to Gil Evans, who said, Miles wouldn't have told you he had everything in the basement if you hadn't first told him you'd gone to the trouble to transcribe the records.

RIP. My personal favorite is Blues Mission (1993). The personnel is nice 'n weird -- Pee Wee is joined by Jack Walrath, Jean Paul Bourelly, Masabumi "Poo" Kikuchi, and Clyde Stubblefield. And somehow it works. Also, a duo album with Horace Parlan is touching. Better than the albums with Archie Shepp, I think. It also contains Parlan's best work from his later years.