Big Beat Steve

Am about to finish his book "From birdland to broadway". A great read indeed. And VERY refreshing to see a jazz musician who is also very articulate with WRITTEN WORDS (not that I would have doubted it - given his account of the 1962 BG tour of the Soviet Union) and can do his memoirs without having to be ghosted (to a greater or lesser extent). After all that's about as "straight from the horse's mouth" as things can get.

OK, understood ...

"EC album" = House of Blue Lights album? So that would have been Paul Motian. Now when did that story take place?

You are referring to his 1954 recording? His first album (the 10-incher from 1954) was named after this tune. I pulled it out the other day to refresh my memories, and this tune may have become a sort of signature tune of his. According to Bruyninckx, he recorded it again in the 60s.

It IS worth finding. I offered myself a copy for last Christmas (when a copy came up at the lower end of the "too much money" price span ). But like others mentioned before, it is relatively slim, so I guess everyone's eternal regret is that Teddy Reig died before his memory could have been "milked" in much greater detail.

CROWN (the "early reissue/recycling" subsidiary of the Modern/RPM label stable) is not exactly top-notch vinyl. 😄 But I guess those who buy them anyway have learned to live with it. One period-original label I (sadly) have come to be a bit wary of and better look twice is the (Danish) SONET label from the 50s/60s. I have had several cases where the records (particularly 45rpm EPs) display more or less numerous warts and pimples that extend randomly across the vinyl surface. Like acute cases of vinyl acne. Worse still - I am under the distinct impression that these warts show up over time as the vinyl "ages" - from no particular age of the record and at an unpredictable speed of degradation. I have been caught out occasionally when I had failed to inspect the EPs before purchase (probably because the records were cheap and I bought them mainly for the picture covers) but I remember buying a copy of the "Message from Newport" LP by Maynard Ferguson on Sonet and am really very, very sure it did not have any noticeable pimples when I bought it some 10-15 years ago. However, when I pulled it out again about 2 years ago (after a longish period of disuse) to spin it I was shocked to see to what extent it had grown warts on both surfaces! Strangely the record still does not skip but it has a very distinct and irregular background rumble and of course this is not the kind of abuse you want to subject your stylus to. Another similar case was the Sonet EP of Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" which I bought back in the 80s at a fleamarket. The surface definitely was OK (though not NM, of course). Recent inspection relevaled it has grown surrface irregularities too - not really warts and pimples but what can best be described as streaking, as in the case of some wooden surface where an insect had dug a path directly underneath the surface. As I have not pulled out this record too often during those 40 years of ownership I have no way of judging this ageing process but it does seem that the vinly of these Sonets somehow just starts disintegrating (like a car panel beset by rust underneath the paint) from a certain age, and once the process has started it tends to accelerate. (It seems like very occasionally this can also happen with early (Swedish) METRONOME EPs) However, this is NOT always the case. Other 50s/early 60s Sonets I have are fine. The other day I bought a period-original copy of the "Count Basie Presents Eddie Lockjaw Davis" LP on Sonet which is in perfectly okay VG+ condition. So I am keeping my fingers crossed it will remain that way now that it has reached that age without deterioration. Close inspection pays anyway - even where you do not expect to find defects of this kind. My copy of the Tal Farlow "Fuerst Set" on Xanadu 109 (not a label that has a bad reputation for poor pressings AFAIK) has some kind of foreign object embedded in the vinyl that shows up as a sort of "floating rice krispie" on both sides and causes an annoying click. I had totally failed to notice this before purchasing as a very quick glance at the vinyl revealed a shiny NM surface and you do not really expect that kind of defect on a collectible label with this pedigree.

I wonder what the artwork people were up to with this one? Doing a (toned-down) Jim Flora imitation? Anyway ... looks like an interesting item to look out for ...

My pleasure.

Still quite an event ... I do hope the "objects" went to someone who appreciated them.

Was this just staged for the TV series or do you actually mean to say he ABANDANED his storage container and it was auctioned off that way?

While I sympathize with the storage problems (I am running out of shelf space myself if I want to keep my collection arranged correctly and am thinking of gradually downsizing in other areas of my "collectomania" myself) these recurrent talks about renting storage units give me the creeps - not least of all because of the (apparently considerable) monthly outlay. Admittedly maybe also because this is an approach that is relatively rare over here. I wonder when the "Storage Hunters" crew on TV will cut open the locks to a storage unit crammed full with Mosaic sets or a similar collection ... 😕

To the best of my understanding, no one around here said that women instrumentalists were not deserving of more widespread reissues. But it just is that at this point (of the reissue market at large and of the situation at Mosaic) it does seem to me (even as a VERY casual buyer of Mosaic product and certainly not a Mosaic fanboy) that they just cannot afford (and therefore are unwilling) to do a set that looks very much like it will be uneconomical, to put it mildly. Not to mention licensing problems which - again - have nixed more than one MALE instrumentalist project too. As for politicising the music, you can only go so far before this is bound to turn nasty. And the point of nastiness is likely to be reached once people get the feeling that they are told they have a political "obligation" to embrace (listen to or buy) this or that music. This is thin ice and a slippery slope ... Pity, then, that this thread degenerated this way just because there's one here who seems to be unwilling to acknowledge the above realities. P.S. Just to continue the actual thread and its suggestions, here's one artist that for some reason has not been named yet. (Was this because everyone was aware of the recently-released box set linked below, I wonder?) HAZEL SCOTT! https://jazzbluesnews.com/2023/04/13/review-hazel-scott-great-scott-collected-recordings-1939-57-2023-video-cd-cover/ Too lightweight for Mosaic? Don't know (and don't care). Female instrumentalist (WITH a political angle to her biography) that certainly is given some belated acknowledgment? Definitely. But can anyone blame Mosaic for not going that route now that the potential buyer segment is covered by THIS reissue? (How many Hazel Scott completists would be out there anyway?) But isn't the bottom line: Reissues giving more credit to female jazz instrumentalists ARE happening. At least here and there. So ....??

Yes, I did notice that too. These missing sessions make up part of Vol. 15 of the Complete Duke Ellington vinyl twofers on (French) CBS. One of the two from that series still missing missing in my collection. (Vol. 14 - also missing - is on the 2-CD sets from the "The Duke" series that I do have so that's settled)

As I doubt that you can see the existence of female vocalists as a simple counterpart of (or equivalent to) male band vocalists in the REAL life the way it ACTUALLY was during the era in question ("was" because Mosaic is a REISSUE label), this would very much rule out the relevance of male vocalists then, too. OTOH no doubt you would have dismissed Ina Ray Hutton "at the front of a band backed by male musicians" too. For reasons not difficult to guess. But it is a fact that quite a few superlative female vocalists with a large body of recorded work did exist and were given the Mosaic treatment. Should they have been discarded because they were "not instrumentalist enough"? Weird ... Why not accept the fact that NO - you cannot change history (let alone rewrite it, no matter how much some would long to be able to do that). So until the existence of a customer base for a predefined "female leader" Mosaic set can be proven to exist (BTW, @all - may I suggest another one from right in the middle of the period often covered by Mosaic? VALAIDA SNOW!) you are in no position to accuse Mosaic of anything (least of all sexism because many MALE artists have been rejected by them for the same reasons of lack of sales potential) if they just do not see fit to knowingly produce a set that sees them finish in the red. You DID take note of the licensing problem evoked before here, didn't you? And as for the market situation - as outlined by others, your appeal is way too late. You should have said this in the HEYDAY of Mosaic (and see if the licensing problem could have been resolved then). Now they seem to shy away from a lot of artist projects they would very likely have tackled 20 years ago. Understandably, sad to say ... BTW, let it be said that I'd still be all for a representative "all-female band" box set (because from the tunes that I have heard I do feel many of them would have been quite able to hold their own against many of their their male Swing-era colleagues too). But how likely is that to happen? By ANY reissue label? For obvious sales - and probably licensing - reasons (unless an enterprising Public Domain label would chime in - like Fantastic Voyage did on occasion with relatively obscure artists, but that's an entirely different playing field). Because - how many are out there among the buying public who'd be adventurous enough to tread off the beaten paths of the known and tried-and-tested musicians and "names" from the Swing era? Unless it was forced unto them as part of a "label" package (such as Capitol or B&W in the case of Mosaic, for example).

Here is the full track listing for those who want to check and compare: https://www.discogs.com/de/release/12812646-Duke-Ellington-Duke-Ellington After a rough check with other reissues, this 10-CD set seems to be chronological indeed, starting in 1938 and continuing to c.1945. But after a quick comparison with the CD series below it seems to be far from complete. https://www.discogs.com/de/release/5679460-Duke-Ellington-And-His-Orchestra-The-Duke-Edward-Kennedy-Ellington I have three 2-CD sets from that series (bought secondhand as "chance purchases" but as it happened they did fill a gap among those CBS 2-LP sets I was missing). Since the Duke Ellington discography from that period had been prepared well by the "Complete" RCA and CBS reissue series in the vinyl era the groundwork was laid for Public Domain labels to pick up and recycle the material later on.

Rhoda Scott had an extensive run on Barclay on the 70s and 80s (similar to Shirley Scott - no relation - on Prestige in earlier years).

Case in point re- my earlier post ... I've got this one on the below Affinity reissue. Can't say it's bad but can't say either that the cover "artwork" is on a level with the original (and it definitely is one of the better Affinity jobs).

Why not? I am sure there are zillions who feel exactly that way about enjoyment when it comes to Blue Note (owning them included, of course). So your feelings counterbalance these a wee bit ... As for their design, yes they do have "house style" going for them - but the Affinity reissues from the 80s did NOT help any in that respect. Neither did those on other reissue labels fomr the 70s/80s. So given the leess than widespread availability of Bethlehems, you often had (and sometimes still have?) to settle for these reissues on an "it's only about the music" premise.

Which styles/categories of music, exactly? They are not all alike, don't cater to the same tastes, and tastes and preferences of musical styles do differ.

@onxidlib: The cyrillic spellic you give DOES say "Dusko" and not "Dusan", however. As for omitting the accents, of course this is primarily a matter of writing convenience (be glad you don't have to write a throng of CZECH names or words ... THERE the accents are all over the place 😄). Omitting them could indeed change the proncunciation but I still think that omitting them in NAMES for convenience (for non-native speakers) is a small price to pay if otherwise the spelling were to remain unaltered in WRITING (i.e "Gojkovic" throughout for the man in question). But you never know where and how this kind of pronunciation problems might surface ... There is a moment on the "Boston 1950" CD feat. live recordings by Serge Chaloff where the club announcer points out the upcoming attractions at the Celebrity Club: "... and also Earl BOSTITCH!" (clearly audible murmur from another person in the background:) "BOSTICK!" (befuddled announcer emits lame excuse and corrects himself:) : "BOSTICK" Imagine this chap would have had to announce Earl Bostic one day and Dusko Gojkovic the next .... "Man, I'm lost! "

I didn't mean you, of course, but the Anglo (or Anglo-American) writers/journalists/population at large. Obviously this IS a problem and pronunciation of names in foreign languages does not come naturally to everyone all the time. But WRITING them is a different matter and should not be dictated by pronunciation as long as it is not a case of transliteration. BTW, Gojko Mitic is very well-known here too, due to exposure to East German Westerns.

You mean "pronouncable" or "writeable" (without causing major hiccups)? 😉 (Assuming, of course, that the accents are - understandably - omitted anyway for ease of typing ...)

Good and interesting point. And a recurrent "problem": The main point in Gojkovic's case was that Serbia also uses Kyrillic lettering whereas Croatia uses Roman letters throughout. So this already might give rise to a difference. Not to mention the fact that the "Serbocroatian" universal language of Yugoslavia is something that probably neither Serbs not Croats nor any of the other ethnic regions down there would want to be reminded of too much anymore today. AFAIK the universally used spelling in GERMAN was and is "Gojkovic". Which is very close to what the original spelling would be in Croatian (or Roman-letter Serbocroat - give or take a few accents ). But try to get English or French language- countries to adhere to something like that ... Which I guess is why Gojkovic changed or "anglicized" his "artist name" spelling somewhat (or let these changes pass ...) once he had gained an international standing. "Your" "Goicovici" spelling seems very "romanianized" which is a different case again (there is definitely no "i" at the end of Gojkovic's original name - and no need for any to be there - but the "i" makes it "very Romanian", right? ) Which OTOH might have a certain slant to it that might raise additional questions (remember the Romanian gymnastics athlete Nadia Comaneci whose ACTUAL name was/is Anna Kemenes as she belongs to the Hungarian minority of Romania ... ? ) So as you can see this kind of garbling up proper names in foreign languages is a true can of worms. In ANY direction. Even without the problem of transliterating (more or less phonetically) proper names from, say, Kyrillic into Roman spellings. Which can seem quite arbitrary or even funny. I have a Yugoslavian LP here with a selection of jazz groups from Belgrade that were recorded from 1955 to 1963. Guess how "jazz" is "alternately" spelled in the (Roman-letter) cover text and many of the "period" band names? "DZEZ"! Strictly phonetic, and apparently quite in earnest ... But they have a way with foreign names over there anyway - even when NO Kyrillic transliteration is involved ...

But that's beside the point. The original question was if Miles Davis really was the "world's greatest jazz musician" in 1963 and could have been called that back then. At THAT time. In accordance with the broad appeal that any such "world's greatest jazz musician" could and would have had. Not from the (hindsight-ish) vantage point of today. And not from the point of view of the "cognoscenti" of jazz and inside the hardcore jazz audience (then or now). By that yardstick IMO it is reasonable to assume (as the thread starter stated) that Miles Davis only attained that position somewhat later on in the "Electric" period with his success in the jazz-rock field.