Big Beat Steve

@BillF: Hope you got this at an affordable price. 😉 I've had my sights set on this one for a time too but wherever I looked the prices just were insane (something like $70 or thereabouts).

Actually that "Rock'n'Roll Hop" is fairly tame, including compared to other 50s jazzmen jumping on the Honking R&B/R'n'R bandwagon such as Boots Brown (Shorty Rogers), Leroy Kirkland, George Wiliams, early Rusty Bryant, a.o. It must have been the "name" itself. 🤨

To close this off, maybe the item below is not a "great" find among my today's haul but I think is a find with a "great" and certainly somewhat funny PERIOD feel IMO. Among the 45s there was a Les Brown 45 with a home-made cover (according to Discogs this one originally was sold in a generic Coral sleeve so maybe this explains that?). The lineup and tunes were written on the back of the sleeve, and according to these "Bernie's Tune" was coupled with a tune simply called "Hop". Checking the label I noticed that something had been neatly taped over: This made me curious and on checking my discographies I found the tune in question is called "ROCK'N'ROLL HOP"! 😄 Could it be that the owner of this record would not for the life of it have been caught playing "that no-good rock'n'roll jungle music"?? 😂 This tampering won't do anything to increase the "value" of the record but this record certainly DOES tell a story (of sorts).

And then ... And an amazing thing .... see the next four items: I have no idea if all of these LPs came from one and the same collection but at any rate they must have taken in the collection of an Art Tatum diehard. FOUR 10-inchers in one load cannot be that current ... Odd side note: By coincidence not all that long ago I bought original 2-EP sets (very clean and not overpriced either) of the above Benny Goodman Trio and Art Tatum Trio LPs on Capitol at the same shop. Now I have them in both formats ... 😄 And to finish off, a few oddball items (that at that kind of money you just pick up for the fun of it or out of curiosity ...) The condition overall? Some covers are rather battered (the US cardboard covers just cry out for seam splits, and these 10" cardboard covers at the time often seem to have been an even tighter squeeze around the vinyl than later 12" pressings, and the stitched German covers don't wear well either - and the browning tape residues from age-old repair attempts just are the pest! But who is one to complain at these prices?). I will have to do a lot of careful repairing of some of the cardboard covers, in particular (from the inside), and others are well worth that 1 EUR each just for the cover artwork. Amazingly the vinyls overall are fairly clean. VG+ in many cases, and even "VG" (which objectively speaking is an euphemism anyway) look like they play OK too. So far I did not see any with really feelable scratches, and most should respond well to cleaning. Seems like they all came from "well enjoyed but still cared for" previous owners' homes. Needless to say, I was pleased. 😉

So ... I rummaged through the 10-inchers and lo and behold, hit several caches that seemed to have been waiting for me. (Of course I do have a good part of the music on more recent reissues and even some of these items but at that price you just cannot let this kind of items sit and go unnoticed. Better to pass them on to others later on ... ) : Next, some of those semi-generic-cover German Brunswicks of the early 50s: The above "Midnight in Munich" 10-incher (a sort of key record in recorded German jazz of the early 50s) was one I had paid fairly solid money for for a copy on international Polydor on eBay about 15-20 years ago. Such is life ... now I have two different pressings and covers ... ) Next ... 😉 (Click on pics to enlarge) .. Cont'd ...

This morning I went to the periodic record clearout sale at the #1 of our remaining local brick-and-mortar record stores again where everything was priced at 1 EUR per LP or CD (50c per 45) today ... (Seeing how crammed full the record wall in my music room is I should not have gone there but I guess most of you know how it is ... 😉) I found a batch of vinyls , including some nice ones such as one of the Texas-Mexican Border Music anthology series on Folklyric (Norteno Accordion Vol. 2), Tiny Parham on RCA Black&White, the Harlem Stride Pianists anthology on RCA, Woody Herman's Big Band Goodies on Mercury (1965), and a couple of items I already have but am sure I can pass on to like minds, e.g Wynonie Harris on Route 66, Louis Jordan from the Decca period, et al. The below 12" originals/early pressings also came my way, and at that price you can take chances even somewhat outside your core interests: The Folkways anthology (Vol. 8 - Big Bands) has its booklet too. As for period originals, I had half hoped the'yd clear out some of their jazz EPs, but not so, though I did find a few nice ones (e.h. one of the Jimmy Giuffre Tangents in Jazz EPs and several Jazztone EPs). But my habit of closer scrutinizing any stacks of 10-inchers that sat among the usual 12-inch items this time paid off handsomely. But that's for the next post ... 😃

Did you receive my PMs and my mail (that included the scans) sent yesterday?

Thanks for the link! Not that I'd claim I would be able to grasp the finer points of Schuller's analysis but I imagine it will be interesting listening attentively to the tune with the text within reach.

I own the book and can check and scan later. Edit: Just pulled out the book. You are right about the pic of Paul Chambers. Mark, please send me a PM so we can agree on the details beforehand of how you'd best like the scan (beyond what you stated in your OP).

Is this essay available online somewhere, maybe?

I have the "Moanin' Low - Torch Songs by Lena Horne" 78 rpm album on RCA. Haven't listened to it in a long time but I see this one is on the right side of her records, then.

And a great and entertaining read. Terry Gibbs' candid personal recollections of certain jazz celebrities he worked for and with are priceless and would not be out of place in Bill Crow's "Jazz Anecdotes" either. Watch out for "the Fog " aka "El Foggo"!

Does your friend go by the name of "Nosey Joe"?

Don't tell me you actually EXPECTED Lena Horne and her backing to sound as "boppish" as the Eckstine band on its own? (But FWIW that particular recording did hint more than just a bit at that "new" big band sound alright IMO) You never saw the "Stormy Weather" movie? Not to mention that even the bebop era had its share of (to use period terms) "warblers" and "thrushes" that had a very balladesque repertoire (not least of all Mr B himself). As for the subject of the OP, 'bout time for the honors. She was in a class of her own.

Congratulations! Unsung heros receiving some documented recognition is a very worthy cause. And I can imagine how annoying it must feel when an "editor" interferes with the contents and makes matters worse. Has happened to me and friends of mine in a totally different "special-interest" area too.

At the sole fleamarket I was able to set up a stall at this year the buyers' audience had gotten significantly younger, despite my "oddball" offerings (jazz, pre-1960 styles only - and then mostly Swing, plus some Jump blues/R&B as well as a bunch of 40s U.S. pop 78s). Not that I had tons of sales but what I did sell pleasantly often went to young'uns more or less well below 30, including several girls who were hip to R&B as well as 78s. And not all of them looked they were part of the swing/retro subculture set.

Confirmed by how seamlessly his Sun recordings were repackaged and marketed for Country sales way back in the 60s and 70s and did not sound out of place one bit but in fact added a special touch - like you describe it. So in the end it doesn't matter if you listen to his recordings as rockabilly or country- they do fit in each time because he always (well, almost always) was himself. And somehow I can even understand that fan author who (back in the late 70s) wrote in a R'n'R/roots music fanzine here "I'd gladly shell out for a 10-LP box set of Jerry Lee brushing his teeth." RIP - Time to read "Hellfire" by Nick Tosches again, I guess ...

The "Bixology" series on the Joker budget label. I remember that one. I held off buying that Bix record series back then because even though they were budget-priced the sheer amount of records added up (more than what I wanted to shell out for that budget series - and as for fidelity, the NORK LP on Joker I had bought indeed had rather poor sound beyond what you can expect from reissues of acoustic-era recordings anyway - so I was warned). Several years ago I finally took the plunge, though (just for completeness sake), when a NM copy of this box set came up in a local record store sales bin. 10 EUR for a 14-LP box is no big outlay. Over time I had bought a couple of vinyl reissues of Bix recordings on "official" labels (CBS-affiliated), and after an aural comparison of a couple of identical tunes on both vinyls I did not notice any significant sonic difference. Recent digital remastering may make a larger difference (as in the case of those relatively recent Louis Armstrong remasterings) but apparently not so in the vinyl era.

Re- false starts, etc. The above reminds me of that Sonny Boy Williamson Chess compilation LP (re)issued in 70s that had one lengthy track with the small print "This track not suitable for airplay" on the back cover - because the "length" of the lengthy track for some reason was made up of a false start and studio chatter and you can hear one apparently disgusted Sonny Boy at one point exclaim "motherfucker" and something like "li'l bitch" or so ... Oh those poor AM radio listener souls confronted with those oh so lewd words in - of all eras - the 70s! What shocks the execs must have dreaded ... Yes, that would be a good idea. Even on single items such as some of those on the Circle label, for instance. Scholarly study is all very well, but is this really what the majority even of diehard jazz collectors does on EVERY listen, even with Bird? Doing one part of the box set with the master takes and then the other part with runs of the alternates, or in fact several runs with alternates (as long as they last, as not all of them have survived with the same number of alternate takes), etc. would be more customer-friendly. It would really be interesting to see a box set with CD1 made up of "master takes", CD2 with "#1 alternates", CD3 with "#2 alternates", and so on. That might actually be fun, with maybe the music becoming more "raggedy" from set to set! Though I don't think it will ever happen anywhere, as of course the scholar fraternity will probably complain.

Amazing that it should be that unknown. This was one of the very first Miles Daivs Quintet records I ever bought (back in the early 80s, I think). German Bellaphon license pressing, of course, but this cover always looked like "THE" real "period" thing to me. Exactly. Both series were all over the place when I started out in the mid-70s (but of course not always all that affordable due to their sheer mass of material, even if you were selective). And yes, the liner notes were a bonus too. It was a real changeup and upgrade compared to many, many other 50s jazz reissues from the 70s too (that seemed to have made point of awkwardly "modernizing" their covers), so very welcome indeed. I actually found that cover artwork fairly timeless and certainly not depressive, so no complaints here. And apparently it was considered"definitive" enough in the minds of some others out there too, so a variation on this theme was revived for the Onyx and Xanadu reissues (with Don Schlitten being the common denominator). I'd be hard pressed naming a real standout favorite among those Prestiges (and the Debut), though. I have 11 out of the 14 LPs (plus an EP's worth of "Walkin'") in the OP's post but pull them out fairly evenly in turns to spin them.

Didn't see this thread until now, but the T-Bone Walker connection looks indeed very much like this must have been "the" ("Drifting Blues") Charles Brown from the start. He played piano on his 40s and 50s sessions so this was the first step towards "doubling" on organ. According to Bruyninckx, he recorded on organ at a session for King in July, 1961, and again for Mainstream in 1963, as well as on one track of his session for Johnny Otis' Blues Spectrum label in 1974. The chapter on Charles Brown in the "Blue Rhythms - Six Lives in Rhythm and Blues" book by Chip Deffaa first published in 1996 specifically refers to his session with T-Bone Walker for Reprise in 1973 among his 70s recording dates.

Indeed ... No trace of it in the Navarro biography by Petersen and Rehak.

I THINK I understand what you are getting at. As a non-musician, what always strikes me about Fats Navarro's recordings is how there are catchy little melodies and riffs here and there and elsewhere woven into the tunes, and they make the music flow and somewhat "easier" to follow, regardless of how "frantic" bebop may sound to the uninitiated or beginners. Of course a good deal of the tribute for these "melodies" must go to Tadd Dameron (on those sessions where he was involved or actually the leader) but still they also sum up the Fats Navarro "style" IMO. P.S. According to the usual (source) suspects,"Bebop In Pastel" is the original title of a tune later recorded by Bud Powell (feat. Fats Navarro) under the title of "Bouncing With Bud". But when "Bebop in Pastel" (recorded by the "Be Bop Boys" under the nominal leadership of Sonny Stitt) was first recorded (3 years before "Bouncing with Bud" but released later) it had Kenny Dorham on trumpet, not Fats Navarro.

Just for the record (literally ): The late 60s/early 70s French BYG reissues of Savoy material were no bootlegs but the REAL DEAL. BYG was the license holder for Savoy masters at that time and thankfully reissued a lot (though sometimes in obscure combinations and often with shoddy cover artwork - but they were there and must have filled a lot of gaps before the arrival of the much more comprehensive twofers and singles in the Arista period of Savoy from the late 70s onwards). (Musidisc incidentally also reissued a number of Savoy records and sessions - apparently after the BYG period, and sometimes with the original Savoy cover artwork, under the Savoy-Musidisc label - licensed from Savoy, according to the fine print on the back cover). The Italian budget LP labels were a differeent matter, and not limited to Savoy.

RIP indeed. Given her age, I had figured she had already passed. Her "Sophotocated Lady" book only touched the surface of her photo-documentary treasures. Let's hope her archives will end up with someone who will be prepared to make really good (publishing) use of it. Not like in the unfortunate case of her contemporary colleague (10 years her junior but deceased many years ago), jazz photographer Hanns E.Haehl (whose photographer credits also appeared under the "Jazz im Bild" name for a time in the 60s). His legacy of photo documents unfortunately sits in an archive storage basement without much (or any) hope of ever being worked into a book. They would very much deserve it too.