Big Beat Steve

Worse than Slim Whitman bursting the heads of the aliens in "Mars Attacks", then? (No, I did NOT dare to listen to the clip )

I've been intrigued by Otis Ferguson ever since reading a piece by him in Ralph J. Gleason's "Jam Session" anthology. Really a tragedy he did not survive WWII. In case anybody knows - what's the approximate percentage of jazz writings in the "Otis Ferguson Reader" book?

Not that rare. Those swing era big band reissue LPs from the 70s such as Sounds of Swing, Bandstand, Golden Era, etc. have been relatively common fare in the secondhand bins for quite some time even over here so i figure this must be the case even more so in the U.S.

Take a guess. Trane has always had a superhuman stature in jazz circles (and certainly so in the early years after his untimely death) whereas Elmo Hope would more fall into the "in-crowd awareness" category. Trying to pitch a sale ... unless my impressions were all skewed this kind of "mis-billing" wasn't exactly uncommon in 70s reissues, even in jazz.

Oh come on ... really now. You know others might think it terribly lame to wield camera equipment around, hopping to and fro in front of the stage and flashing away like mad. (Not me, I've done my fair share of image taking too, but there are moments when I understand each and everyone who thinks this is lame because every now and then there are events where the bunch of "self-appointed pro" photographers who get into the (seated) audience's way just is too numerous). To each his own, then, O.K.?

Thought you'd ask. Have started off with CD2 (Bob Dunn's Vagabonds are comparatively uncharted reissue territory). The tracks sound very clean to me but not unnaturally so as they have a warmth that makes me feel that they indeed did not overdo it with the cleaning up. As I write this, "Stomping At The Honky Tonk" is playing, and it DOES have some very slight background hiss (makes for authenticity, and unobtrusive to me anyway). Might make an aural comparison with the fidelity of the same track on the STR805 LP later on.

Received my shipping today. The Bob Dunn set is presented in a very appealing way indeed. The booklet alone is worth part of the price of admission. While I still regret the duplications of a good deal of the tracks (M. Brown etc.), as a Bob Dunn showcase it all does make sense so no regrets about the purchase itself (neither about that of the other CDs from that series). And order processing and shipping directly from OJL worked a treat, so order with confidence, you overseas buyers!

When the occasion presented itself (or may even have been encouraged by the promoters), I did ask for autographs after the end of concerts that I attended. Usually I brought along LP covers to be signed by the artists, and this made for some nice interchages because some of these long out-of-print LPs brought back memories (or even some measure of bewilderment) to the artists. Not the worst way to start a brief dialogue with your heroes. So this yielded me autographs by Lionel Hampton, Slim Gaillard, Big Jay McNeely, Hal Singer, Sam Butera, Doctor Ross, Benny Waters (who insisted on signing as best as he could despite having gone blind), Claude Trenier, Bo Diddley, and a few more. Like Brownie, occasionally I was able to pick up autographed LPs myself; to me the masterpiece among those is a Verve LP signed by Tal Farlow. I still regret never having made it to any concert by Charlie Mariano (who lived in the area for a long time). I'd have loved to get those 50s LPs signed by him.

This is really sad. Another of the big ones gone. R.I.P.

Jim R, this list cannot be 100% correct. I have an original pressing of Vogue/Swing M33.324 and it definitely does NOT have two takes of "Mon Homme". Not that I would doubt the rest of the release entries but this should not happen in such listings, especially since 10in releases with NINE instead of the usual 8 tracks (and then 2 takes of one track) do look a bit suspect.

And even Shelly Manne's jazzed up version o "Li'l Abner" does have its moments. That said, I cannot find that idea of doing "jazz versions" of musical or movie scores to be half-baked at all. Considering that a LOT of the all-time jazz standards originated as Broadway, musical or other show tunes written for a quite different musical concept, it speaks for the richness of the musical "raw material" that they have lent themselves so well to the jazz treatment. So wasn't it only logical to apply the same approach not only to individual tunes but to the entire "body" of tunes of a given musical or movie (considering this "body" might have been intended as a "unit")? The make or break point IMO only is if the individual tunes had enough to offer. And of course there are better and worse ones. But isn't it just like that with jazzmens' originals too? How many of their praised "originals" are just rehashes of blowing heads or 12-bar blues already heard a zillion times? In short, you really cannot generalize. I for one find the whole "Third Stream" idea a LOT more half-baked, for example (yes I know I am generalizing myself now ).

Interesting ... A one-owner-drum kit from 1940 to the present (and a celebrity owner before that). Can't be many like that. And this here ... "Though an antique dealer offered her family $15,000 for them, Schinella said they didn't want the drums to go to an individual. The chance for more people to see them was more important, she said." ... of course is a highly commendable attitude. Wish there were more like this.

Considering how long serious jazz mags such as the French JAZZ HOT insisted on writing about one Dizzy GILLEPSIE for YEARS after 1946 it is not hard to see how such mixups occur. "The loneliest Monk" is a classic, of course, but several others from that list do have all the potential of becoming both unwittingly wise statements and running gags for years to come.

OK, OK, OK - my order for this set (along with those by Ocie Stockard, Leon Chappel and W. Lee O'Daniel) went out this evening. That enough of a plug for the label??

To an extent I agree, Jazztrain. However, I seriously doubt that "we" are in the minority as far as complaints about duplications (no, make that triplications or quadruplications, really ) are concerned. Western Swing is real minority interest field even amoung Country music collectors, and I'd venture a guess that among those interested in this field the share of those who belong to the "DIEHARD COLLECTOR" category is disproportionately high (cannot be a coincidence that most of those I know, many of whom are outside jazz in their collecting preferences, are of that calibre). That means that there are bound to be LOTS of duplications in the collections of most lovers of this niche of music, especially since quite a few of the key artists/bands (such as milton Brown and Cliff Bruner) have already been covered by what certainly is the definitive word on the subject. And collations such as Bob Dunn's are bit too "special" to attract lots of total newbies too. Of course I can understand the Origin Jazz (and similar labels') approach. When doing their Ocie Stockard reissue I guess it would have been too much for them not to re-reissue their long-OOP vinyl (OJL-8103), especially since this one seems to be among the rarer of those earlier reissues. Owners of the ZirconVert 702 CD reissue will have to live with the fact that this means 8 duplicated tracks. I'll take the plunge anyway (as I will with the Bob Dunn set, I guess). The (almost-)completist wins out but still it is a bit dissatisfying, especially since there still is a lot of music from that segment that has never been reissued. Which is why I openly welcome the Krazy Kat series, even if this means pops and crackles here and there (and the BACM reissues too, though fidelity is an issue there sometimes). In short, narrowing down the arguments in favor of "new" (re-)reissues primarily to remastering questions is a bit meagre in the long run. What about cutting down a bit on duplications and resurrecting more items AND doing top-notch remastering? Contrary to other collectible musical styles I'd venture a guess that we still are FAR from scraping the barrel here when it comes to reissuing never before reissued items.

OTOH Mance Lipscomb was INDEED featured exhaustively on Arhoolie. My 1980 catalog of the label (which I keep for reference) lists SEVEN LPs by the man. And since the Arhoolie catalog lists him (with a section of his own) in the "Country Blues" part, what would you expect of a journalist trying to get into the subject. Songsters may be on the fringe of blues in the stricter sense but where else would you "catalog" them after all?

THANK YOU!!! for making this known. But ... some closer comparison of the track listing with what one may already have (Mmilton Brown etc.) would be called for as for the most part they were not released under Bob Dunn's name but by other (well-known) bands. As I for one have most of the 80s vinyl reissues on the Old Timey, String, Rambler, Texas Rose etc. labels as well as the full run of WS-related CD reissues on the Krazy Kat label and sundry other items I need to find out beforehand and I guess I am not the only one. If these were all by Bob Dunn's Vagabonds it would be easy to check if one already has them or not but so ...? Anyway, the Original Jazz reissues by Leon's Lone Star Cowboys and by Ocie Stockard (despite the likely duplications with ZirconVert 702) from the same series look like worthwhile purchases to fill more gaps too.

High school French won't get you very far with CAJUN French anyway ... Will spin the record later today and see if I can make something of it.

Agreed with the previous recommendations. I wasn't overly fond of those 70s Pablo jam sessions earlier on (had heard lots of them on jazz radio shows in the early 80s but somehow they didn't click with me all the way) but the Basie and Zoot LP was the first of the Basie Pablos I ever bought, and I havent' regretted it one bit. A very solid and valid addition to my array of Zoot Sims records (which for the most part cover his earlier years, though).

As John L's listing from Lord (with a huuuge tip of the hat to Jepsen and Bruyninckx, of course )) indicates, both sessions have been around on lots of period releases and reissues. For example, I have the Pettiford session on Prestige 7813 (O.P. Memorial Album) and the Duke Jordan session on a 70s U.K. 2-LP set titled "The Be-Bop Beyoboard masters"§ (also featuring sessions by George Wallington, Al Haig and Wade Legge that had originally been produced by Henri Renaud). The Duke Jordan items were also reissued on Prestige (PR 7849). Don't know what the present connections are between Prestige and OJC but maybe this OJC project of the "Birdlanders" did not have access to material from the Prestige (reissue) catalog??

Very sorry to hear about that. It's happened to two members of my family (LONG "before their time had come") too so I am afraid I do think I know how you feel. Hang on!

Well, if you'd read "The Birth of Bebop" by Scott DeVaux... http://www.amazon.com/Birth-Bebop-Musical-History-Foundation/dp/0520216652 ... while listening to the music on this box you'd soon think differently. This author turns the Hawk into a seminal bebop figure that towers so sky-high above everybody else in the development of bebop that it borders on the unfathomable. :D

The criticisms of the Proper label are more aimed at a certain species of Proper box buyers. Many seem to take offense at anything that comes out of certain Spanisch and/or Andorran labels (even if they clearly are within the 50-year Public Domain limits) yet drool heavily over those Proper boxes that go just the same route. An extreme case of double standards IMHO. I haven't heard much criticism about fidelity of those boxes, though. Those boxes that I've heard (not this one, though) are quite OK, though to my ears some of the 78-rpm era recordings on some of those boxes sounded a bit "unnaturally clean" (not disturbingly so, and of course I do not know which source of previously reissued AND remastered tracks they had dug into for their own "re-reissues".

Thanks for the reminder! Would fit in well with what I am curently listening to so I think I'll give mine a spin too:

Listened to the Quincy Jones LP last night (after not having dug it out for a long time), indeed nice vocals, nice lyrics (that are an ear opener and it is all the better that the lyrics are printed on the cover ) etc. and they do swing, though I must say that the extreme vocal(ese) gymnastics thrown in liberally really are an acquired taste. Straight after that I put on the reissue of the EmArcy LP by the BLUE STARS http://microgroove.jp/mercury/MG36067.shtml Probably relatively conventional compared to the Double Six, but at least as highly enjoyable for the vocal quality and the reworking into French lyrics too IMHO.