Big Beat Steve

Sorry if I oversimplified matters. What I meant to say is that most of the black audience that had been the DANCING audience of swing bands a couple of years earlier did not care for the bebop bands as bands to DANCE to and turned to jump blues bands instead (I am talking - roughly - about the 1945-50 bands here). Even many of those who wrote jazz history from a "modern jazz only" angle acknowledged that all in all "jazz" lost its dancing audience with the arrival of bebop. A statement likely explained by the fact that they did not see fit to include many of those musicians who DID cater to the dancing audience into the history of jazz anymore (at least not those in the R&B field). Well, yes ...

Just to make matters clear, it was definitely not YOU I was thinking of when I said there were and are people in the discussion of why to "elevate" jazz who have/had an "agenda." As for what's beyond the scope of the thread (true ...), I was just referring to your assertion that "Jazz has always aspired to be a musical form on par with so-called 'serious', classical music." (Always??) OTOH, as for this remark of yours, " Everyone should also know that the focus of jazz post WWII was on Bird and what followed. That's called history, and if you don't know it you don't know jazz. " Now if this isn't condescending ... I'm almost inclined to think I know more about the history of post-WWII jazz than you do. Your statement just reproduces the oft-followed practice where certain parts of jazz were written down (and off) by (primarily white?) jazz scribes. No doubt that Bird and the bebop movement were at the core of the major lines of development of post-WWII jazz but were they the whole picture of what there was in the field of jazz as taken in by the AUDIENCE? Most parts of the black community that had been dancing to black swing bands only a few years before by and large did not give a hoot about BIrd and the beboppers but went for other, more danceable styles of jazz (yes, jump blues aka early R&B) which was the OTHER line of development of swing-era jazz after the end of WWII. And the borderlines between both were blurred anyway (ever listened closer to early Gene Ammons or Leo Parker, to name just two?) and IMO both lines of development were only made out to be so incompatible by those who felt they needed to form the shape of jazz through the public exposure they were able to use (e.g. through their writings in the media). But NOW we are getting off-topic.

@ATR: Well .... words can imply and convey many meanings, including that "it's fine with me" might very well be understood to mean "oh well .... do so if you please but don't expect me or anybody else to take it all that seriously". Because it HAS been used that way. So if read like that then it can well be understood that way (maybe not if heard in a face-to-face conversation but this is one shortcoming of forums as we all know ... ). Anyway ... your assertion that "jazz as dance music pretty much went out" is rather a sweeping generalization that really ought to read "jazz music as dance music pretty much was pushed out of the picture by interested parties", don't you think so at least a little bit if you look closer? Sounds more and more to me like even in this respect (defining what jazz was and was not at that time) there have been forces at work over and over again through the decades that set out to shape and rewrite history (just like it has been discussed in all directions in this thread about the question of how many musical or show tunes became jazz hits - which really is a very minor aspect in the overall picture, isn't it?), likely in an either misguided or - worse - calculated attempt at obtaining "respectability" for jazz and elevate it onto an "art" pedestal on a level with classical music by whatever means it took. But what for? As if classical music automatically was on a higher level that jazz had to be "elevated" to. Wouldn't jazz in its many facets have been able to exist on its own terms? And why should jazz try to humor the audience of classical music in the first place?

No need to be so condescending as for "Whatever gets you through the night" ... True, jazz was no MAJOR force to be reckoned with anymore when it came to jazz as DANCE music - BUT: A good deal (if not most) of this was and is due to the fact that whoever considered themselves the enlightened scribes, academia bigwigs and/or promoters of "valuable" jazz systematically dismissed those styles of jazz (and wrote them off as being outside jazz) that DID get people to dance, ranging from late 40s jump blues through soul jazz (that - comparatively speaking - was relatively accepted but had the scribe vultures sit high on the power lines throughout anyway, waiting for whoever they could castigate for "honking" or other commercial or uncouth, all too down-to-earth blowing or tinkling) through certain types of 70s fusion and up to the 90s neo-/retro swing movement. "WHAT? JAZZ THAT YOU CAN ACTUALLY DANCE TO? THEN IT IS NOT JAZZ! IT CANNOT BE JAZZ!" And if this did not silence those jazz fans who appreciated those styles of jazz ANYWAY and DESPITE what the "powers that be" wanted to proclaim to be the only "valuable" forms of jazz then that jazz "fraternity" tried to excommunicate them for indulging in music "of no musical value" and/or allowing jazz to be "dumbed down". (Says who? Those who've found themselves in Third Stream dead ends or those "free" styles that were misunderstood as "free for all" and sought legitimacy for their OWN, subjective definitions of what was and wasn't jazz and - to get back to the core problem raised of many posts in this thread - tried to (re)write jazz history to fit their own agendas?) Even if danceable jazz covered only a minor segment of the wide field of jazz - it WAS and IS there, proving that it CAN exist and CAN be done. P.S. I for one can very well enjoy a 50s Miles Davis Quintet record, for example, for relaxing late-night easy listening every now and then and find nothing wrong with that at all. Takes some previous listening but that's all been done ...

I am afraid you've nailed it. I've had the same feeling every now and then (not just in the field of music history). Erroneous statements of "facts" put into printing by reputedly authoritative sources (though clearly incorrect) tend to be taken as the gospel truth after a while if read and quoted often enough. Talking about dumb mistakes that ought to have been spotted (such as in your example or that of Simon Weil), it is a moot point IMO if these errors ought to have been spotted by the author or the proofreaders but in fact you CAN sometimes make an attempt at setting the record straight. Some time ago I came across a similar rather glaring error (that should not have happened to ANY writer in this field) and will therefore just quote part of my review I put up on Amazon, hoping it might rebalance the rating of the book: It is about "Dance All Night - The Other Southwestern Swing Bands" by Jean A. Boyd (about some lesser-known Western Swing bands), and I did have this bone to pick: "... there are some factual errors in the book that are hard to understand. To name just one example, "South" was indeed a tune picked up by many 30s and 40s Western Swing bands but how could this possibly have been suggested to the Light Crust Doughboys as "the new release" of the Bennie Moten band (the originator of the tune), given that Moten recorded the tune in 1928? It almost was an "old chestnut" by the time the Western Swing bands picked it up. ((The tune was recorded by the Doughboys in 1940, BTW - 12 years after the Moten original, so I guess my comment was being kind )) And as for Count Basie taking over the Moten band because Moten "quit the band business"? Dying on a doctor's operating table due to a botched tonsil operation and leaving the band leaderless from one day to another certainly is a way to "quit the band business" but is this really an appropriate way of summing up the man's history? No doubt ANY however brief bio of Bennie Moten consulted for reference would have highlighted this fact." A glaring blunder? I'd say so. Sloppy researching? I am afraid so. Couldn't care less (because it is not part of the core of the history)? Hopefully not. Not wanting to overrate the effects of an Amazon review (just an attempt at setting things right a little) and not wanting to make this review sound like a case of "look, I've spotted a mistake" but this should not have happened in the first place. And to me it read like more of a blunder than the question of how many "My Fair Lady" jazz albums actually were hits. ANY bit of research done should have yielded the correct facts. The author is at her third book in this field so will probably be regarded as an expert in some circles, yet to me her writings in many instances read not so much like those of someone with an innate feel for all the meanderings of the history of the music and the musicians but rather like those of an interested outsider (or observer) looking in. Rather odd for someone who is a professor in music history. Anyway, it's a pity ...

Bought this one a couple of days ago: Chet Atkins - Teensville - LSP 2161 - "Guitar With A Beat"

See? You weren't one that I was targeting in the first place. I have long had a feeling for myself that there is jazz for the brain (modern jazz, mostly) and jazz for the guts (R&B etc.) - with some overlaps of course and blurred boundaries. Fine with me as there is a time and place for everything and I am able to enjoy both on their own terms. And even better if you can combine the two (like many musicians managed to in the swing era). And if this can be combined in today's jazz again - fine. And I read something like this from your previous posts. It just galls me that there still are those out there who seem to consider themselves part of "those in the decades-long know" ("jazz acedamia"?) who still sneer at jazz that is out to entertain and is gutsy and straightforward enough to have the immediacy to get people up and dancing. If there are those who feel they prefer their jazz in a more sedate, concert-like atmosphere of aloof, earnest, sophisticated appreciation throughout - fine, there is a place and time (and market) for this too, but this is not all and certainly not the beginning and end of jazz as it "ought" to be enjoyed. And it also appears to me that given a certain awareness of some of the more immediately accessible facets of jazz present even AFTER the spread and development of "modern jazz" after WWII quite a bit of what Leo P. does, for example, is a case of "nothing that much new under the sun". More power to him if he can blow off the cobwebs in a few corners of the jazz world as he IS taking things a step further but OTOH he definitely is not breaking as much new ground as some might make it out to be in today's media - or so it seems to me anyway ...

Just watched the video of that pink-clad Leo P. doing "Better Git It In Your Soul". Fun, entertaining and foot-tapping, for sure, but how many tunes played one after another like that (with THAT "shtick" as some are wont to say around here ) can you stand in such a setting without a feeling of things becoming just a wee bit repetitive? (The second video equaled the score a bit, but that dancing-honking thing seems to be his core act) And what's that string (as opposed to "jazz on string instruments") section doing there? Waters everything down for commercial appeal with the broad, non-jazz-minded masses? Ho hum ... But the REAL thing: HOW MANY of all those art-minded "serious" jazz connoisseurs (including quite a handful of forumists ) out there have been moaning for soo long about those bad, bad, commercial R&B sax honkers and jump blues men who showed in the 40s and 50s that jazz CAN be played AND danced to AND get a foot-tapping groove going that gets you going but had to take the whipping from the ivory-tower "art" jazz crowd for "dumbing down" the oh so lofty art of the jazzman-turned-artists and certainly NOT entertainer? Even soul jazz had to take an unfair beating time and again later on ... Totally ignoring that there are MANY ways to skin a cat, that music serves a purpose and that jazz is a VERY wide field and one approach doesn't necessarily invalidate the other if the purpose is taken into account. So, take note, Leo P.: The REAL Leo P. (PARKER ), Big Jay McNeely, Chuck Higgins et al. did that thing (and more) 60 years ago ... And the novelty NOW only is because we don't have much period video footage to speak of and only Bob Willoughby's photos to try to re-live the onstage impact ... And is his pink stage attire in those videos a coincidence? Reminds me of a horn-blowing Brian Setzer trying to jump on the Cherry Poppin Daddies bandwagon. Nothing bad in itself - and I still feel there was much to serve as an inspiration for a new approach to ANOTHER strain of danceable jazz in the musically more successful parts of that retro swing movement of the 90s (that still hasn't abated totally worldwide, take note!). I've never particularly liked punk rock but found some interesting crossover influences at work there and producing an additional nuance in the wide field of jazz, some god, some bad (as EVERYWHERE), but the good added a welcome new facet. But how many "art jazz for art's sake and nothing else" exponents have ridiculed that movement from Day One in a heavy-handed, indiscriminate manner that did not even take note of those nuances. Seems to have conflicted heavily with their acquired attitude to how jazz was supposed to be enjoyed, whereas I'd bet quite a few of the same wisecracks decades ago went all overboard in their appreciation of other rock influences in jazz rock, fusion and whatnot ... And now jazz as such seems to have arrived in the intensive care unit to an extent that seems to require infusions (including "savvy" marketing gimmicks) by the ones discussed here ... lo and behold ... So ... ain't it 'bout time you high-brows (you know who you are, and maybe it's not actually you who are extrovert enough to be spurred into immediate reactions to this rant ) pay the forefathers their dues (including in RE-WRITING for yourselves the appreciation of the tradition of jazz!) if you feel the need to start drooling about those new-fangled Leo P's called in to give a "new" lease of life to jazz (which is only "new" to the unaware because they apparently chose to ignore what's been out there again and again (from the honkers to the retros) for decades ...) And don't bother retreating to an evasive line like "if you can't hear the difference" - look at and listen to the essence of the impact as it wants to come across and see where you are from there ... My rant, my 2c, but I stand by it ...

FWIW, referring to the 45 vs 33 rpm war and assuming you and your sources are implicitly referring to the 45 "album" sets as those GATEFOLD cover EP sets too, RCA and Capitol (to name just two) carried on releasing their LPs as 3-EP 45 rpm sets too for quite a while into the 50s (at least until c.1955, it seems). Some I have in my collection: - Nick Travis - The Panic Is On - The Don Elliott Quintet (the back cover lists Shorty Rogers Courts The Count, Inside Sauter-Finegan and Shorty Rogers & HIs GIants (Morpo, bunny, etc.) a.o. as being available as 45 rpm EP sets too. - JImmy Giuffre Trio (Four Brothers, Sultana, Nutty Pine etc. - 2-EP set) And this is from the inside cover of the Stan Kenton Showcase - The Music of Bill Russo 2-EP set: (This listing does not look just like random 45 releases but like consequent programming of the contents of entire 33 rpm albums as 45 rpm EPs too, and not just as excerpts like they did later on):

Not mine. I listened to several to of the popups from the first series and wasn't overly impresed. That Venice gondola thing reminded me of a sort of modernized single-sax Billy Vaughn. What kind of exposure does one need to let herself be put online in a video surrounded by barebellied, potbellied beach crowds shooting handy videos of oneself? Must be in dire need of attention of ANY sort ... And where's the swing? With the best will in the world I cannot even make it out in the way Jimmy Giuffre aptly said about the beat of some of his 50s avantgarde music: "It is understood".

FWIW, here is a bit more info on this UNITED ARTIST(without the "S") label: http://www.45worlds.com/78rpm/label/united-artist Evidently not a complete listing at all, but giving a bit more context.

Yes, I remember seeing that in a newscast on TV after he had died. Falangists not even that "old" but relatively young (in their 30s or early 40s) saluting at his casket ... eerie ...

Whatsamatter? Looking on in bewilderment ... This thread clearly turning political and mods galore participating gleefully? Forum rules overturned, revised, ignored or what? That apart, this sums the gist of the discussion up pretty neatly IMHO: And there is plenty to address when it comes to the impact that gender discrimination has had on women jazz artists and jazz in general. But in the case of this thread and Grace Kelly, it seems to me some posters here simply find her not to be on par with the amount of hype and publicity she's received. Hardly the first time that's ever occurred in the world of jazz!

Sales assistants selling to themselves or among each other ... If this sort of "sales perpetuum mobile" would work it would have been invented long ago.

I certainly hope the do see the Savory set through until its release and marketing in due form (and for an appropriate span of time). That would be a major accomplishment as it makes NEW music available. As for whatever comes afterwards ... big shrug ... (after all that's gone on in recent months you tend to be more and more fatalistic about it ... )

I'd be interested in hearing about the DETAILS of what may not be up to snuff (by what criteria?) there or what "stories" there are anyway. (And of course it would be interesting to see if really all of the Uptown material would be new on the market) Besides, wouldn't it be sad and uncalled for, particularly among real jazz connoisseurs, if the Basie band were reduced to Lester Young only?

In what way? Curious to know .... Even in the vinyl days live recordings by the 40s Basie bands were fairly plentiful. Admittedly I have a LOT of Basie on vinyl but not nearly all of those airshot/live LPs issued in the 70s/80s - yet those I do own already include some 7 or 8 LPs with material from 1944. So what else is out there, I wonder, that transcends (on average) everything so far issued? Or doesn't it, after all?

I do hope they will stay around to see the Savory set through and release it.

The record in my copy is in a clear plastic sleeve and there is a sheet in Japanese (with a translation of the liner notes and some other info that may relate to the release of this album as it specifies "Not for Sale" in the midst of Japanese signs as well as a date of March, 1983, at the end. No tokens that I can identify.

Exactly. It does say Not for Sale in fine print on the bottom of the back cover too. Which is why I guessed it to be a promo. I had somehow overlooked this Discogs entry. Those I saw in the overview listings allindicate the 61007 catalog no. So it IS a promo, then. Thanks for pointing it out

Thank you!

I checked amazon.com and the price indicated there in US$ for the 5th ed. matches the price you quoted. I missed the "for rent" line on amazon.com (never seen that category before) for the 3rd ed.. My fault. So it is secondhand or pay up indeed. Secondhand copies on amazon.de start at $30 too, so ... I agree with your point about the style. I'd find that off-putting too, and I've been disappointed in a number of cases where interest in the subject matter made me jump for a book. I won't name a jazz book written by a board member here on a subject I find very interesting where reading is very, very tough going, and I am not sure yet if this is partly due to my lack of deep knowledge in music theory, but it is a tough row to hoe. I'd cut that one some slack (as no doubt it is very profound), but another one bought recently is to some extent overladen with what you call "academic verbiage". It is a series of essays on individual aspects of European jazz, and some are more "accessible" than others, but those that go overboard in their acedamic pretense - ouch ... If the most frequently used term seems to be "vernacular" then I am beginning to wonder ... Of course jazz (particularly its early history) is part of "popular" music rather than classic or "serious" music so if you have to circumscribe the notion of "popular" (in a looser or wider sense - we are not talking about dialects or folksiness etc.) to this extent by such academic deadweight, then .... And I can well imagine such academic lingo to be even more burdensome in a book on rock where the music and the target audience on average should be even more down to earth than with jazz (taken as a whole across all genres). Anyway, so this book has been settled for the thread starter, I guess ... BTW, talking about the UK and scholarly writing, did you ever see this one? https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Britain-Got-Blues-Transmission/dp/1138259357/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520081654&sr=1-1&keywords=How+Britain+Got+The+Blues The title sounds exceedingly scholarly but this book seemed to fill a niche in writings on my fields of interest in music I took the plunge, and I found it a surprisingly good read as an introduction to this subject from an angle not covered in other books touching on the "white British blues boys" phenomenon (particularly when read in conjunction with other related books).

Are we talking CD or vinyl? I bought Vol. 1 on LP (80s reissue) about 20 yars ago and not all that long afterwards came across Vol. 3 as a Japanese facsimile pressing that looked like Vol. 1 and 2 except that the script on the front cover wasn't red but brown and that where the catalog no. was to go (1507 or 1508) this pressing had just ???? on the front and back. I was intrigued by this as I was only aware of Vol.1 and 2. As the shop owner told me and as the liner notes (by Michael Cuscuna) confirmed these had remained unissued and had been dug out later on the Japanese (who else?) for release on LP. https://www.discogs.com/Jazz-Messengers-The-At-The-Cafe-Bohemia-Volume-3/release/3510742 Contrary to the above and similar listings, however, my copy does not have the 61007 no. anywhere but just the ???? (and no "limited edition" text next to the High Fidelity in the top corner either. Just a no. DY 5805-01 in small print in the bottom left corner of the back cover and on the label where the actual no. would be supposed to go. Do I have something special there? A promo pressing?

The book/edition of "What's that Sound" (a line that I am pretty sure comes up in quite a few other rock songs too, FWIW) shown by the thread starter retails from $15 or so. Is the new (5th?) edition that you seem to be referring to (and that IS expensive, according to Amazon) worth that much extra money? If the 5th ed. has been updated only with more recent developments since the previous edition then it probably is not what the thread starter is looking for (as he says he has a particular interest in 60s/70s rock). Amazing, BTW, that the newer the editions, the older the cover layout seems to get. This 5th edition shown on Amazon looks like an early 70s PRINTING to me. Baffling! The kind of effort to recapture a "period" feel one only sees very rarely these days in book artwork. As for the "short shrift/no shrift" problem - maybe a general problem with books that set out to cover an all too wide field in one single tome (considering the diverse developments in rock since the 80s alone)? I've often found that many authors writing about a "history" in the field of popular music are very much skewed with too much of a bias towards the most recent happenings (with the possible exception of jazz). What's been big in the, say, 10 past years figures prominently in there but the preceding periods are almost only covered by the huge, huge names that still are fairly huge (or remebered through recycling in omnipresent oldies shows) at the time of writing, and this slant becomes more pronounced the further back you go in history. Whereas, if you were to do the subject justice, you'd have to give each decade fairly equal coverage to highlight those that were big in THEIR day (but may have been forgotten except to REAL fans and collectors since) in an even manner that reflects the TIMES and presents the ENTIRE picture of the history in a balanced way. Because who knows who from the most recent years given huge coverage now will still be a household name 10 or 20 years from now, particularly if you take today's increased media exposure into account?