Big Beat Steve

Wondering ... "more assertive than he would be in a while"? More assertive than he was earlier on (FWIW, I love his Prestige twofer which WAS earlier) or more assertive than he was later? (when exactly?) Have some of these tracks been tampered with or are there different takes in circulation on the various existing reissues? My version of this on (U.S.) Progressive PRO-7001 has track timing that sometimes varies widely from the Prestige LPs, for example.

An interesting approach. I think I wil have to do some Kenton relistening next time I browse the "noir" subject.

How many "Hen Gates" were there actually? I know of 2 who were documented. Maybe there were more ...

See yesterday's exchange with Niko.

True and reasonable in today's publishing world. But do they really grasp the feel and essence of the specific style of music and its enviromnent, then? Particularly if you have to go back a bit further in history. Some are good at it (and sympathetic), some (much) less so ... IMO there are too many music books out there that reek of the author's "Hey I can write about THAT musician /THAT style of music too!" attitude to further his own cause.

OK, good for the author, shame on the reviewer. The excerpt seems a bit more "tangible" though I wonder how many listeners there ever were at a concert like that who felt they were in a "conformist lockstep" that needed to be "broken". Anyway, without wanting to advocate simplistic writing that doesn't do the subject matter justice, I think I've had enough reads where I had to wade through the show-offiness of the author whose main messages seemed to be "see how many oddball words I know and can use instead of straightforward ones that get the message across too easily" and "don't expect me to write a book for just music lovers - my sole target audience is my academic peers - and then on up from there ..."

+1 Pity considering the subject matter ... BTW, to the author: if you HAVE to quote French (for effect's sake), make dead sure you are quoting it correctly. It is "quoi", not "quois". Talk about going out on a limb ...

This is what could be translated as a wholesale purchasing cooperative (for retailers, evidently).

Mike, you did well to buy the English edition. I would have done just like you. I see the German translation of the book (translated directly from the Braziliam-Portuguese edition, it seems) is from the HANNIBAL Verlag. I own several of their German-language translations of musician biographies (Kenny Clarke, Woody Herman, Dexter Gordon as well as Sally Placksin's "Women in Jazz") that were for sale very cheaply at Zweitausendeins years ago. They all are OK but overall rather stiff and stilted and just not quite "in tune" with what you would expect from a bio on music matters such as this. Music history books like these are a bitch to translate if you want to fully reproduce the feel and atmosphere (German may not be the very best language for this anyway) but overall the ones from Hannibal (at least those I've read) are more mediocre than some (rare) others that are better that I have read.

Seems like you in the Netherlands are catching up indeed. Over here vaccination rates have accelerated too and are progressing better now (at last) but overall the entire organization on the national, regional and local level for the most part still is ONE HUGE MESS!

That game can continue elsewhere among the VERY famous now-deceased if you insist. Check out this post by Chris Albertson of 15 Dec. 2004 here: (well, I think you probably remember it anyway)

Had my second (Biontech) shot yesterday (about 27 hours ago now) and so far I am doing alright. A bit of a pain in the arm where the needle stuck and very slight headache this moring (like it can and does happen every now and then at other times too). But I'm taking it easy anyway. Hoping for the best and for ongoing responsibility exercised by the OTHERS out there too (though not overly optimistic, alas ...).

Wow! I appreciate your efforts, James. No doubt I already have a fair bit of the studio recordings that he participated in but I'll get this anyway "for the rest".

The album has several tracks with a Bossa feel. I guess "Internatonal jet set album" might not be the worst description of that album, actually. Somehow a lot of the tunes remind me of 60s film music scores and some of these tracks might have provided a background for movies like "L'homme de RIo" (The Man from RIo", 1964) feat. Jean-Paul Belmondo.

I have very little of actual Bossa Nova or Bossa-ish recordings from that era but here is an album I tend to play as well for its touch of Bossa Nova here and there when I am in the mood to spin the Bossa-ish tracks from Oscar Peterson's "We Get Requests" album. BTW, the Sacha Distel album is from way past the year of 1963 that you praise (1968, in fact). TTK, you're famliar with that one?

Seems like it ...

If this is so then I have another one for you: One to be heard to be believed too. Eat your heart out, not just you Yardbirds but John Lee too.

He was HUGELY successful in Germany and toured everywhere all of the time but he was Czech, that's a fact. And as far as I know he never made his permanent residence outside Czechosolvakia. BTW, as I just saw now on reading his bio on Wiki (FWIW) he was one of those who signed the Communist-party initiated "anti-charter" AGAINST the liberal-freedom-minded "Charta 77" - which some held against him. Another one with more facets to his personality than some would imagine ... BTW, for you who appreciates music off the beaten tracks of the obvious, try to get your hands on his early single that has his (English-sung) cover version of "Be Bop a Lula". Which will explain to you where many younger European singers of the (late) 50s and 60s came from. Overruling post-war U.S. influences all the way.

I like my fair shares of oddball music and have been guilty of buying some, but not in my wildest nightmares would I want to find myself actually spending money on ANY of his records ... .. and I still feel sort of ashamed of that day in, I think, 1970 or so (when I was about 10) when I urged my pa to step on it on the autobahn to make it back from our uncle's place to our home in time for the start of the TV "Hitparade" where Heino was scheduled to appear on that particular Saturday evening ... (But things abated fast after that, though there still must be a 45 from that era somewhere around in a hidden corner - actually one with a picture sleeve dating back to BEFORE the doctor ordered him to wear "sunshades after dark" (and before ... ). Heino was the epitome of square - maybe actually square enough to make him cool again in some circles. I guess .... His way of singing (including the allegedly rolling "r" which in fact was just part of a somewhat TOO clear diction by contemporary trends if you DO speak German and get the lyrics) may be reminiscent of some regions (I know a region way north of Frankfurt where they roll their "r"s like crazy) but is not something specifically Teutonic per se but rather a singing STYLE of "popular" baritones from way, way back (be it in "volksmusik" or elsewhere) that for some reason came natural to him. Including the "marching rhythm".Yet I think I was not the only one who at the time wondered if the way he sang was that he MEANT it that way or that it was a put-on to try to see how far he'd get with that ... and get away with it (very far, it seems ... ) His South African tours and Schlesierland singing came at a time when nobody in their "right" mind in the music-LISTENING world at large took him seriously anymore so that did not do lasting damage to his reputation with the general public or media. At any rate, next to Red River Dave he was virtually nowhere ... FWIW, I have seen one or two interviews with him from his (more recent) rock days where on general topics he showed a relatively liberal and commonsensical attitude. Getting wise as he aged? As for his more recent "rock" period, this of course came up for discussion in some rock listening circles and apart from the fact that most did not take it very eriously, teh consensus most often was that he did it on the premise of "I have gone that far and am that far beyond good or bad or whatever that I can do whatever I please and get away with it because I am beyond categorization ..." And he wasn't far off the mark, I think ... As for that "oompah" music - don't get those styles wrong ... What Heino did often was not just "Schlager" in the stricter meaning of the term but more often words put to "Volksmusik" (that often is perforemd as instrumentals), and this was and is no strictly German affair. It's not limited to Bavaria but you are just as likely to find that "oompah" in Austria, some regions of Switzerland, the Alsace region of France, Czechoslovakia, and all this come not just from those of German descent but Bohemians too, for example. (I'd bet some of the U.S. ethno-music heritage, e.g. whatever the Polka bands play if it is not strict polkas they play, takes its inspiration from that kind of "Volksmusik" too). Anyway ... this a truly funny thread. Amazing to see how someone like Heino can be given that much shrift here - of all places ... P.S Karel Gott was Czech (and proud of it), not German.

Bought this one some time ago and am gradually reading my way through it. Interesting from the wider angle the author adopts. While doing an online research on one or two of the sources mentioned in the bibliography I also came across those two items below and found them tempting enough to my interests to pull the trigger: So all these will probably keep me busy for quite a while, particularly since they are no easy reads (though - at least "in my book" and as far as I can see, "easier" than Tom Perchard's "After Django). And right now my musical reading alternates between "Making Jazz French" and the end of Vol. 1 to be folowed by Vol. 2 of Allen Lowe's "Turn Me Loose White Man" anyway (which I find extremely interesting and informative but challenging too). For some lighter reading in between, I still have to continue and finish Dany Barker's autobiography ("A Life in Jazz") from the lot of secondhand books I scored in early January.

Ezz-thetic (Prestige, 1951-53, including a sessin wiht Miles Davis) And though not wantin to toot the Eurojazz horn too much, give the following at least a try: Young Lee (Vogue, Paris 1953) Lee Konitz in Sweden 1951/53 (Dragon) Cologne session 1956 (Konitz-Koller-Gullin, rec. for mod records, released on Carisch, reissued on the Mod records box set) Zo-Ko-Ma (Attila Zoller-Lee Konitz-Albert Mangelsdorff, MPS 1968)

Rooster, please have a look at the "Jazz in München" book by Hermann Wilhelm and Gisela Kurtz published in 2007 by Lenter's in Munch. On page 104 (in a chapter dedicated to the "Domicile" club) they specifically refer to the concert with Benny Bailey and the Mal Waldron trio that according to the authors was a highlight of the concerts at the club after it reopened (following extensive renovation of the club) and became the very first live recording at the Domicile that was released on record (and was the first in a series of "Live im Domicile" releases). Besides, according to the credits Joachim Ernst Berendt (the jazz pope #1 in Germany and an authority in every respect imaginable at that time) contributed the liner notes. Would he have put his name under something faked up - like those cheapo US records with fake applause on Crown? At that time? With this overriding "art" approach to jazz by everyone involved? Really?

I do like a fair bit of the Kenton output but I was baffled too when I saw that at a local 2nd hand record clearance sale but (IIRC it's the "Stan Kenton in Hi-Fi" album with bonus tracks) but it's a nice item for the car CD player (though the label does keep amusing me even now, not so much about what the jazz world would have been like if Kenton had actually been a BN artist but about to what marketing lengths and idiocies some label image marketers go ).

Like Stan Kenton's Capitol albums from the 50s. That happened in the CD era.

All set to continue reading with Vol. 2 as soon as it hits my mailbox so I for one am rarin' to go.