Big Beat Steve

Why was I half expecting an exchange like this?

Yes, having gradually become aware of the grain of salt that RR's Bird bio needs to be taken with, I had my apprehensions too but as far as I can judge he does not go that overboard in the way he captures the essence of the bands he describes. At any rate I felt he did manage to make the music come alive in his lines. And his book and Pearson's are different enough in their approches so they do not really duplicate each other IMO.

That would be this one ... http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catal...0252013362.html Actually I was thinking of that one as another example of how to make oral histories work. I read this book with great interest in the 90s (time to dig it out again) and a couple of years later got a secondhand copy of Ross Russell's book on Kansas City jazz too (to finally make up for the fact that I had missed out on it in the late 70s). I find both books complement each other well as their appraches are quite different. But how would you - and others - make the comparison?

Well, I feel I have only touched the tip of the icebeg. Of the biographies of lesser known musicians you mention, I feel the one on Danny Barker would be #1 for me right now - but who knows ... I've read "Honkers & Shouters" as well as John Broven's "Rhythm & Blues" too and agree with your comments (BTW, if you liked the subject of John Broven's book, also check out "I Hear You Knocking" by Jeff Hannusch aka Almost Slim). As for "Central Avenue Sounds", I bought this a couple of months ago and had high hopes for this but (sorry to say) put it aside about halfway through - for the time being at least. The book certainly is not bad but IMO the basic idea of presenting history by way of oral narratives works far better in "Hear Me Talking To Ya" and also in Ira Gitler's "Swing To Bop". IMHO "Central Avenue Sounds" could have benefited from a slightly different selection of the interviewees that made it into print (I understand there is a HUGE LOT more oral history on tape in the archives - there is another thread herre where this is detailed). E.g. interviewing all three Woodman brothers who essentially repeat the same thing from only slightly different angles is a bit wearying. The way it is the reader really has to search for the actual info on Central Avenue here and there and to and fro throughout the book and is all is a bit overly loose. Another aspect is that this book probably was written WAY too late. It ought to have been written in the 70s (or 80s at the latest) when a lot more Central Avenue "survivors" still were around to provide THEIR oral input. But well ... I can always get back to that book again later (and definitely will).

Yes I forgot that one. It is a VERY good read indeed. And if you read that and want to SEE what you are reading about in there, try to get hold of his "Scrapbook of Jazz" which will give you the picture (literally) spotted liberally with typically Condonish captions. BTW, I did not find George T. Simon's "The Big Bands" that dull at all. it really needs to be taken and used as a work of REFERENCE on the individual bands and band leaders, not a sequence of short biographies in the strictest sense of the word.

I'm no authority on which biographies would be most worthwhile OVERALL as I've touched only on a small percentage of what is out there (dictated by my own musical preferences). Unless you have a LOT of time you cannot read all that are out there and that are worth reading anyway. Not by a long shot. I haven't read the Art Pepper and Hampton Hawes autobiographies yet (they will follow eventually) but I guess I can live without some that others would consider essential. IMO it also depends above all on which musicians are among your jazz listening favorites. If the musician is one you take a particular interest in and if the bio is any good then you will devour it anyway. OTOH, no matter how great a bio is, if the musician featured in that bio is one that is not in your main center of interest you will probably not get THAT much out of it. Another criterion would be those musicians that you consider "kingpins" of their era and musical style (i.e. reading about their lives will also tell you a lot about that particular era or style of jazz etc.). It is in this latter sense, for example, that I have appreciated the bio on Big Jay McNeely a lot as a source of info on early post-war R&B, or the bios on Milton Brown and Bob Wills as providing lots of info on Western Swing. Generally speaking, to name just two examples, the autobio by Terry Gibbs ("Good Vibes") is definitely one to recommend. It is not only hilarious in places (Terry Gibbs is a great storyteller) but also captures the atmosphere of those times very well. In a totally different (more scholarly) sense, the Dick Twardzik bio ("Bouncing with Bartok") also is one I more or less read from start to finish in one go (though there are some who do not seem to agree with some of the author's conclusions about this or that detail).

Thanks for the info. Will have to investigate that. I really enjoyed the compilation of his 40s tracks on SeaBreeze so this one sounds good.

That's right. The BONDE system is familiar but I've never seen any CD drawers in the shops around here either.

If you check out the recent (voluminous) threads about the bios of Fats Navarro and Thelonious Monk you will see that not any but MANY of those around here read jazz musician bios. My own copy of the Fats Navarro bio arrived yesterday, and I've absorbed my bit of bios of jazz and jazz-related artists through the years mself. Starting out with Ross Russell's Charlie Parker bio in my very young collecting days, and followed later on by the autobios of Count Basie, Charlie Barnet and Terry Gibbs, plus bios on Woody Herman, Dexter Gordon, another one on Bird, then Lester Young, Tommy Dorsey, Kenny Clarke, Hal Singer, Dick Twardzik, Louis Jordan, plus others on the fringe of jazz such as Muddy Waters, Tommy Johnson, Charley Patton, Bob Wills, Pee Wee King, Milton Brown, Big Jay McNeely, Wynonie Haris, etc. And no doubt others will follow in due course. But one word of caution (though maybe I'm stating the obvious): Don't reduce your "learning" about jazz to jazzmen biographies. Books on specific aspects of jazz (such as those on Kansas City Jazz, West Coast Jazz, 52nd Street, Bebop, or Ira Gitler's "Swing to Bop", "Jazz Away From Home" about jazz expatriates, etc.) will give you FAR more about the broader picture. Artist bios IMHO are more the icing on the cake. BTW, what's that book by Mike Zwerin you are referring to?

Good questions. What I think you mean is "When did U.S. popular/show/Browadway music stop adding to songs that might be turned into jazz standards?" Right? FWIW, I remember reading a review of a jazz record of the late 50s that was made up of tunes from some Broadway musical and the reviewer kept referring to the odd song selection, incliding "Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most" as an example of tunes that would probably never make it into standards or even be remembered by other jazzmen to be picked for versions of their own. Ho hum ... (Can't remember the leader's name but the record is BOUND to be out there...)

To stay on the same level of prose: "Keith Jarrett is in (albeit intermittently defective) contact to eternity" :D

Yes, please do! And if he happens to have a copy for sale tell him he's got a taker here. BTW, I would not mind ordering it outside Germany anyway.

I do have the Prestige 7665 reissue LP. The track sequence on the cover and the label is that listed above as being the "current" AMG listing and the 1996 card listing in Jim R's post above. And these do appear to be sequential, i.e. 4 tracks from the session featuring Sonny Rollins first and 6 tracks from the session without Rolllins (i.e. with Art Farmer as the only horn) second. I'm not sure I really managed to follow your above discussion about what is wrong. Is it that the problem is that "I'll Take Romance" and "Autmun Nocturne" have been switched around? I admit I am not sufficiently familiar with those two standards to identify them offhand but what is identified on the record as "Autumn Nocturne" does not have a sax on it so seems to be correct.

That's all very well but the link on the Baudoin Federation website leads into a dead end. No chance there, it seems (or the website has a severe bug). BTW, this is the kind of swing compilation I'd buy unseen and unheard (and have hardly ever been disappointed before) so no need to convince me and I'd really like to get my hands on this one . Too bad I seem to have missed Durium's mention of this in 2007. Anybody got an idea where this might still be available?

Do you happen to have a lead on where to obtain that 2-CD set "JAZZ IN LITTLE BELGIUM" mentioned here and in related threads?

Boy, how I envy you all ... How do you manage to keep that much free space for framed pics and artwork? My house isn't THAT small but the surface of 2 of the 4 walls in our "music room" is taken up by records, more records and then music books, more music books, etc. Walls in other rooms have been covered (partly by shelving for other books) to the DESIRED (!) extent so what is there left in the music room? A narrow strip of wall surface both sides of the window decorated by framed copies of a few Herman Leonard pics (Dexter Gordon and Terry Gibbs), and ONE measly free wall surface accentuated by a framed poster of a 1998 (ex-Bill Haley's) Comets concert (courtesy my better half as to her it holds fond memories) and a copy of the 1960 JAZZ KALENDER (obviously no pages get torn from that one anymore) - and even that sole remaining surface is diminishing as another row of CD shelving is crawling up from underneath.

1) Kenny Dorham tp, Julius Watkins frh, Billy Mitchell ts, Milt vib + p, Curley Russell b, Kenny Clarke dr N.Y., Jan. 25, 1949 3) Bill Massey tp, Julius Watkins frh, Billy Mitchell ts, Milt vib, Walter Bishop hr. p, Nelson Boyd b, Roy Haynes dr N.Y., Feb. 23, 1949 All according to the liner notes of "Bluesology" (LP), SJL 1130 Will have to dig a bit deeper in the Savoy discog. by Michel Ruppli for #2 Till later!

IMHO you are dead right there. The cover of "Exploring the Future" may be an attempt to cash on on the Sputnik fad but a bit of fun that marks the cover as a sign of its times is in order sometime, but I've really never understood why everybody (DB, Gordon, Gioia, AMG) seemed to see fit to put down this particular release in their reviews. It definitely ain't THAT bad and it's a nice, straightforward blowing date, even if the music isn't as adventurous as the album title suggests (but doe sit have to be? The reviewers ought to know best about marketing forces at work ). Seems to me like with all of them the reflex of "This is not on a renowned jazz label, it's on an indie that has got almost no jazz credentials to speak of, and what credentials it has are in the field of the oh so lowly R&B - ouch!" was at work here.

I thought the 'Rare as Hen's Teeth' selection was pretty pricey - but there again it always was. OK, there was a Roswell Rudd 'America' French LP but at £50? I'll stick with my 'Free America' CD. Just as pricey as the items in the "Rare as Rocking Horse manure" bin that Ray's carried downstairs in the Blues section for a while. Hens' teeth upstairs in the middle of the jazz room and Manure downstairs back at the wall. I remember the first time I came across this downstairs rare items bin I noticed one of the rare items they had was a copy of the Cyril Davies LP released in the 70s on Doug Dobell's Folklore label (and bought new by me back then at Dobell's) - now (late 90s) going for 40 quid! Whew ... but I knew that in THIS case I definitely had done something right in my purchases!

Me too. Based on a mention in a recent thread here. Am really looking forward to that one. And then Amazon has received orders for more from me that should be on their way to me by now: - The Music and Life of Theodore Fats Navarro: Infatuation (Leif Bo Petersen) - Come In and Hear the Truth: Jazz and Race on 52nd Street (Patrick Burke) - How Britain Got the Blues: The Transmission and Reception of American Blues Style in the United Kingdom (Roberty F. Schwartz) (again further to a link in a recent thread here) - Country: The Twisted Roots or Rock'n'Roll (Nick Tosches) - Blue Rhythm. Six Lives In Rhythm & Blues (Chif Deffaa) - Unsung Heroes of Rock 'n' Roll: The Birth of Rock in the Wild Years Before Elvis (Nick Tosches) (long overdue but that's how it is sometimes ....) - Group Harmony: The Black Urban Roots of Rhythm & Blues (Stuart L. Goosman) Looks like a long reading winter ... In the meantime I'll try hard to extend my bookshelves in my music room.

Da bees knees, you mean? :D Thanks for the reminder, might spin it again tonight, seeing how it's being plugged here. Remember those greyish/light brown cover Blue Note twofers (and single LPs) that were around for a long time? This one was out as a single LP reissue in that series. Amazing that Blue Note hunters should have missed THAT !

Which is why wrote the above re- sjarrell's recommendations. Glad to see I am not the only one who is interpreting the thread that way. And to push things a bit further along those lines, if you want to look a bit beyond the Pacific Jazz and Contemporary labels (where there's a lot to discover, of course), try to check out the MODE label catalog (much of it reissued by VSOP or in Japan) or the Liberty "Jazz In Hollywood" series (only part of it actually was taken over from Nocturne). Some of my personal favorites from that Liberty series are the two Buddy Childers LPs ("Sam Songs" and "Quartet") but I don't know which would be the most easily accessible recent reissues.

Yes the above really are nice enough but don't you think you are about to fall back into what might be termed "West Coast Hard Bop"? Kind of redundant if - above all - one is out to grasp the essence of relatively "cool" West Coast Jazz, isn't it? Or to put it another way, IMHO many of the above records tend to fall into one SIDE aspect the West Coast "jazz scene" of those times. Just like the Central Avenue scene of the late 40s was one aspect of jazz on the West Coast (an important and fascinating aspect and yet it was not at the core of West Coast Jazz per se - note the slight difference between the "jazz on the West Coast" and "West Coast Jazz" tags ). Shorty Rogers, Howard Rumsey, the Gellers, Jack Montrose, Jack Sheldon, Bill Perkins, Shelly Manne, Bob Gordon, Bob Cooper, Russ Freeman, Hamp Hawes, Richie Kamuca, Marty Paich, Lennie Niehaus, Harry Babasin (and many more) - this is (a bit more) where it's at.

Thanks for linking that story. That ties up a few loose ends of who was where with whom, and seeing the connection with Camden Town I now know (and am much less surprised) why I was able to dig out quite a few very interesting jazz EPs (and also some nice original and reissue LPs) at rather fair prices in the vinyl basement of RHYTHM Records during my stopovers in Camden Town in the late 90s. Seeing that Rhythm Records was the original Honest Jons Camden Branch carried on by one of the partners it all makes a bit more sense now.

That 4CD European 'Complete Joe Maini' box is definitely worth seeking out. Speaking of box sets, may I give a big plug for THE COMPLETE NOCTURNE RECORDINGS - Jazz in Hollywood Series (3-CD box set Fresh Sound NR3CD101 - and NO, lest someone come up with the worn-out "Andorran thieves" argument again: NOPE, this set was endorsed fully by Nocturne co-founder Harry Babasin!)