Big Beat Steve

See here: He is already coming under flak.

IMO your sentence says something else again: Not having enough clubs is not the same as not having enough customers of the target audience who live closely nearby and tend to go club hopping each night. California DID have its share of clubs AFAIK (see the books etc. on the subject of Central Avenue, for example) though no region could probably have competed with New York (but that's a high yardstick anyway) but maybe the population density and spread AND their personal background (of those who had moved in only fairly recently) actually WAS different at that time and that MAY have played a role? (Sociologists to the fore! ) As for "grinding intensity" - oh well, you know how too many scribes's minds work - throw in images, allusions, indirect statements, alliterations (whatever) by the shovelful .. just to conjure up the image of the literarily proficient ... all for fear of a rather more "matter-of-fact"-like style that might see them labeled as being too dry or too "scholarly". Besides ... if you throw around images you will be harder to pin down in your statements ...

I mean what the hell does that mean? Living cheek-by-jowl in NYC is "conducive to bebop's grinding intensity? Bebop flourishing (or at least finding it easier to get some response) in the climate of a dense network of clubs, bars, lounges (any place that featuered live music, or other venues where music blared out to the public through P.A. systems) where you literally just had to drop out of your bed to end up in front of the bandstand? As opposed to "sleeping suburbs" where you would have to travel some distance to catch any sort of "niche" live entertainment at all (the suburbian neighborhood tavern where the sole jukebox is stocked with the latest pop or country fare only doesn't count)? Just guessing ...

But wouldn't the number of original sessions be more indicative of any primary geographic impact that they may have had (assuming that indie labels would initially be distributed above all in the area where they were recorded and pressed before achieving nationwide distribution)? No, I DON'T think that what Myers says is valid in this form but yet I think that in order to try to evaluate the original reach of the music from that period at all you would have to think in terms of the typical original 4-tune/2 78 rpm record session format prevalent in those days. What may have been released much, much later by way of alternate takes etc. is fairly irrelevant to the way the recordings and records were perceived originally IMHO.

I can not tell you. I was there twice or three times in 1998/1999 and found a few nice and fairly priced long-OOP R&B and swing LPs but the impression from some 15-16 years ago obviously cannot be representative of what there may be today. What they state on their website reflects the impression i had then pretty well, though. But from a brief conversation with the shop owner I noticed that even then he was well aware of other (potentially more profitable) outlets. I mentioned a Jazz Couriers LP then released on MFP (originally definitely a budget label) that I had seen at quite high prices at London shops during my visite there the days before and he told me that Jazz Couriers LPs (even this one) would "go straight to auction", i.e. not finish up in his shop racks. That shop did/do list items on eBay in later years too, BTW.

I am VERY interested not only in bebop but just as much in post-war R&B/jump blues and also in rock'n'roll (i.e., in this context, the roots of rock'n'roll) so a box set that explores widely ignored examples of cross-fertilization between bebop and jump blues would be VERY welcomed - but THIS?? In the context of Charlie Parker and Dial?? Ho hum .. Never mind the East Coast vs West Coast debate, but could it be that Marc Myers has been listening to a totally different box set focusing on Leo Parker and Gene Ammons? (Now there you have two artists who straddle the fence between bop and R&B, including one Parker!)

Odd locations for record shops seem to thrive (for the time being?) in the UK: I stopped by this store a couple of times in the late 90s when I was there for a festival weekend: http://www.grammarschoolrecords.com/ Glad to see it is still in business.

May the New Year bring you all the music you want to hear/discover find/buy (whatever ... )!

I haven't bought any of these Real Gone sets but must admit I am tempted by the Gigi Gryce set for the simple reason that it includes 1 or 2 LPs that go for such silly prices even for simple CD reissues elsewhere (for whatever reason ...) so that these LPs alone are worth the price of admission for the entire box set - and those that I already have from that set will end up as CD player fodder in the car. It is just as TTK says: If those "legitimate" sources would get off their asses and get moving then a lot of this discussion would be redundant. Don't even bother doing yet another re-re-remaster-mastering - just keep stuff that has already been reissued in print or splurge out another pressing run outside ripoff postage Japan sources (in order to keep the prices to a reasonable level) and that will be enough ...

Thanks for that explanation. I wonder if this is a problem of the way Richard Havers does his books (that may actually be aimed at newcomers to some extent). A couple of weeks ago I treated myself to the "Verve - The Sound of America" book by the same Richard Havers and am also very much impressed by the pictures/graphics/facismiles/artwork. The texts do seem to sum up the history behind Norman Granz and the label nicely within the space confines available (though I am far from a JATP expert to be able to vouch for the accuray of the dates he rattles off). But some of the texts do strike me like being written to non-collectors too. Wonder what others who have both books would have to say by way of comparison ... One related question: How about the photographic substance of the early years of BN (40s) in that book? I hope Richard Havers does not AGAIN milk the Library of Congress source of William Gottlieb's c.1947 jazz photographs until it's about bone dry? These pictures ARE great and I have dug deeply into that LOC website some years ago and marveled at what there is but it can become tedious if you start seeing them everywhere instead of other source material (that MUST be out there). Havers seems to be fond of milking that Gottlieb LOC source (apart from the Verve book, see for ex. his "Jazz - The Golden Era" book which is OK for the price it usually retails at and obviously is intended as an introduction, but illustrating several decades of jazz with mainly 1947 "period" photographs does wear thin after a while).

Point taken about Jimmy Giuffre if you (and/or Dan Morgenstern) refer specifically to bop (I was more thinking of modern jazz in the general sense of "post-swing"). I agree about Tony Scott (his pre-Asian recordings, of course, in this context) being an acquired taste but at any rate he had a voice of his own. The Most brothers were on my mind when I wrote "Who else" and my fault I did not think of Sachs, Wickman and Kühn. (BTW, how about Hank d'Amico for another first-generation bop clarinetist who rose in the 40s?) I agree that Buddy De Franco was a calibre all of his own but at any rate, there WERE other modern/bop clarinetists who were no slouches either. Getting back to Buddy DeFranco's recordings, a question to those more familiar with his recorded output: What's the general story behind his MGM period? I have some of his 78s as well as a 10" LP and some of the reissued tracks on Classics and generally like them but wonder a bit about where to site them. A bit ballad-heavy for some tastes and some of his playing does seem a bit .. shall we say ... "straight" to me. Did he try to go for a share of the pop market there?

Am a bit surprised about what that Dan Mrogenstern quote claimed in that interview? Buddy De Franco the only clarinetist who "caught on to the new jazz language"?? Jimmy Giuffre? Tony Scott? Who else (even if not of the stature of Buddy De Fraco)? And who knows where Stan Hasselgard would have gone if he had not died an untimely death? Certainly Buddy De Franco would not have been considered a major swing clarinetist per se who made the "transition" to modern jazz? What he did before modern jazz came along only were his first flings with professional music and when he made a name for himself he WAS part of modern jazz? For all the merits he had, at any rate he really cannot be considered the "only" clarinetist in modern jazz?

Which goes to show that Kenton's fans (among whom I modestly count myself too, if that point needed to be made at all ) are above the blinded "can do now wrong" idolatry that fans of other musicians (jazz or not) indulge in. And like TTK put it correctly, nothing wrong with music reflecting a specific period nicely. Echoes of an era ...

In what way? Stating the obvious? Written by the superficial for the clueless or newbies who may just have heard of Norah Jones? Or ... ? Just wondering (in an attempt to understand) ...

I agree about the latter distinction but (to me anyway) it appears to be of minor importance. After all Kenton did evolve; quite a bit of the "pompous" aura that reigned for a time in the 50s (and certainly was different again from early post-war 40s Kenton) was abandoned in the 60s and even many of those who used to dismiss him sternly in the 50s acknowledged that he did swing then after all. Apart from that, of course Kenton was and remained Kenton, and I canot see anything wrong with that, unless people tend to embrace change for change's sake, and in the end the evolutions of some other artists may just as much have been a lasting uncertainty about in which direction to go. IMO Kenton certainly did evolve by his own terms and he firmly believed in what he did. Which should be fair enough as a basis at least tolerate him, even for those who are confirmed non-Kentonians (considering how many others whose jazz is rather far out in their own way too are still lauded for sticking to doing what they believe in and nothing else). There should be room and space for lots of different streams of jazz within the huge river of jazz, and one man's pompousness (not my kind of favorite Kenton either, BTW, but often I think I see his point) is another man's screeching.

Not so sure about that ... IMHO his brass-oriented big band sound and all the highs and even some "shrieks" that started from the 40s onwards set the overall mood for the overall sound patterns of many if not most big bands for decades to come, particularly in Europe, and even at a time when Kenton no longer was in the jazz headlines. The warm reed sound of most of the typical 30s and early 40s big bands as THE dominating big band sound never was to return (not that brass-heavy big bands sounds are a bad thing - they just ARE different). And no doubt this can NOT only be due to the fact that in the time that has passed since, there never seemed to a shortage of brass section players suitable for big bands anywhere whereas reed section players (particularly those who could "carry" a big band) semed to be few and far between. Besides, space age bachelor pad music to listen to when sipping your martini does up conjure a specific era and atmosphere, so what's wrong with music inevitably referring to that atmosphere and having no updated, directly linked modern equivalent? You don't do space-age bachelor pad movie score musci anymore today like you did in the late 50s and 60s either so that might be considered a dead end too?

For German MPs fans and those who read German around here: A bit of online coverage today (a bit of typical media blurb nonsense in there but generally sympathetic): http://www.stuttgarter-zeitung.de/inhalt.hgbs-studio-in-villingen-warme-toene.7642af34-f9e5-478e-8588-ad4c1a2294d4.html

When it comes to remembering things, you sometimes associate the strangest situations. I had been aware of what the Profumo affair essentially was (though it was before my tmie - I was 3 then) since the mid-70s through some book on British beat music that presented the musical events of the time against a brief background of topical events in Britan that happend in the respective year. But what made the Profumo affair and its year stick in my mind forevermore came in 1984 or so when - in one of my scrapyard sprees for parts for the 50s classic car I owned then - I rummaged through the driver's cab of some dilapidated early to mid-50s 1 1/2 ton truck and, much to my surprise, unearthed a crumpled, yellowed 1963 German tabloid where the latest developments of the Profumo affair made the headlines on the title page. Which goes to show how long that truck must have been sitting in that yard ...

Well, that record is in Bruyninckx' discography Lionel Hampton leader dates listings (rec approx. 1962-63) so apparently this record IS known to discog buffs. And Bruyninckx lists a second single from the same session (Maybe Tomorrow/Nothing's Impossible) issued on Cameo.

Like said earlier, I won't be playing because I have about 90% of those Dials in what certainly is listenable enough fidelity for me (yes, I know this won't convince ANY of the "upgrading fraternity" around here ), but yet this is an interesting project. What baffles me in this debate, though, is how everybody was full of praise for those newly remastered Armstrong Hot FIve reissues that according to the general judgment of the results brought out nuances and details never heard before, and apparently without any detriment to speak of in other areas, whereas these Dial masters (which are 20-25 years younger after all) really seem to be very much of a mixed blessing. So how "rotten" (comparatively speaking) IS the source material after all? The way Jazzbo describes the foreground benefits and the background drawbacks as well as one outweighing the other (but just outweighing it in the sense of a tradeoff between those parts that are better than before outweighing those that are worse than before but not as a matter of whatever change there is being ALL for the better) this really sounds like not such a clear-cut sky-high improvement after all. Could this a) be a case of modern-day remastering techniques still reaching their limits if in your attempt of improving what you can improve you also bring out undesirable substandard portions of the recorded sound that you cannot separate from what you intend to improve and make audible? and b) is this why (in laymen's terms) older remasterings often ended in muffled sounds because in the remastering process of the day they cut off the unwanted sections, losing wanted (but unseparable) sections at the same time and thus narrowing down the range? Now you bring out the wanted parts but cannot suppress the unwanted parts - 2 steps forward, 1 step back ... c) Could it be that Mosaic by all means wanted to do this but now finds the going was far rougher than anticipated and now needs to come forward with whatever explanations they can, realizing that by their overall fidelity and restoration standards this may not be a top-tier result?

There must be another recent discussion on this very topic around here. As for the machine situation, it should be remembered that that article linked above of course is US-specific. I understand there are companies both here in Germany and in the Czech Republic (catering to the demand here in Central/Western Europe) that are firmly entrenched in the vinyl pressing business and to the best of my knowledge their machinery equipment is not made up of historic relics only.

Thanks for your comments and explanations! Do I get you right, that fade-in and fade-out refers to 7 to 10 years BEFORE and AFTER the 1945-80 period, and not that only the 1953-55 to 1970-73 period will be covered in real depth? IMHO as a reader you cannot grasp the early period of post-1945 development of French jazz if you aren't aware (or being made aware) of what happened there during the occupation and immediately before that. So I will be looking forward to this book being one that (more or less) picks up in the depth of its coverage where the books by Régnier and Legrand left off. As for "NOSS", obviously I would not expect an English-language book aimed at the corresponding target audience (even with a highly specialized subject like this) to be generally aware of the contents of Tournès' book (ah, those non-English languages, that uncharted territory ... ) but I certainly will above all be looking forward to your book filling all those gaps that his book left open. While I, for example, find the (period) critics' stance on jazz often almost as interesting as jazz as played and recorded by the musicians, OTOH all that rambling on in Tournès' book about the structure of French radio, for example, and why and where and how jazz could get a foot into the door or not (or other - pardon - trivia) really is disproportionate when you want to paint the overall picture. So .. no, those "denser sections that linger on critical issues" sound interesting (BTW, without elaborating too much myself, despite all his skewed persepctive and "moldy fig" one-sidedness, Panassié DID rightfully point a finger every now and then at a few blind spots that other critics and media had when it came to evaluate jazz across the ENTIRE spectrum beyond the intellectual aspirations of jazz during those years. So .... realistically asking as a customer .... when do you expect the paperback version to be out?

Very interesting! I seem to remember having read a preannouncement of this (on Amazon?) when I recently ordered the Fremeaux box set of the Ferret brothers' recordings. May I rattle off a few questions hoping to get an answer "straight from the horse's mouth"? 1) What will the "post-war" focus be, i.e. how far does "post-war" go and is there a period that where there is a particular focus on? Or is the coverage spread evenly? (I for one, for example, find that French jazz (particularly modern jazz) up to, say, 1960, is often given short shrift in publications once you go beyond the typical St. German des Prés and existentialism settings). 2) I've read the reviews that were linked and am wondering ... from the perspective of a reader interested in the music and its finer details but also the setting that the music flourished in (but still concentrating on the music), what is the balance between the music and societal, sociological, political and other aspects, i.e. where is the "scholarly" focus? Example: I found "New Orleans sur Seine" by Ludovic Tournès very interesting but honestly, that in-depth coverage of the HCF, the schism between Panassié and Delaunay, the structure of radio covering jazz, tour promoters and whatnot really crowded out the MUSIC and the MUSICIANS to a very large extent, concentrating a bit too heavily on the organisational framework that jazz was presented to the public in. Interesting but far from the whole (or a balanced) picture and the subtitle of the book certainly is misleading. Not that I would mind a scholarly approach and reflections on society (though I have found a few "scholarly" US books on jazz and the swing era a bit tedious to read), it just is a matter of getting an idea of what to expect. "Jazz et société sous l'Occupation" by Gérard Regnier, for example, really was a fascinating read from start to end, though the author certainly did NOT concentrate on only rattling off all the musicians that there were (more in-depth coverage of the many artists from that era would be welcome anyway) but really managed to make that era come to life for us latter generations. And "Charles Delaunay et le jazz en France dans les années 30 et 40" by Anne Legrand is the perfect complementary book IMO, BTW. Hope you get the gist of what I am trying to find out ... - Finally, the paperback will be identical in contents, right? Not abridged or so? Thanks beforehand for any input you may want to share. Good luck and I will keep an eye on this!

It is my alley too but MY alley really is already built up by about 90% so I am not going along. But I am curious too, of course ... Mosaic has set high standards so this (and the fact that the EXACT nature of the source material used seems to remain "in a mist" ) may explain some hesitations voiced here.

Seems like you really left no stone unturned?