Big Beat Steve

Of course that photograph shows Big Jay McNeely. This pic was taken at a Midnight Matinee Concert organized by Hunter Hancock (which does explain the - predominantly - white audience, I think) at the Olympic Auditorium in L.A. on 6 October 1951. The Big Jay McNeely bio "Nervous Man Nervous" by Jim Dawson explains how that concert (and others of that kind) came about in L.A. This photo also figures in the liner notes to the Big Jay McNeely "Road House Boogie" LP (Saxophonograph BP-505) from the mid-80s, and the liner notes to this album provide some background on the L.A. scene. More info on the black and white interaction at the club gigs and concerts in L.A. in the first part of the 50s can also be found in the liner notes to the "Jimmy Wright - Let's Go Crazy Crazy Baby" LP (Saxophonograph BM-1301). This and many other photographs taken by Bob Willoughby at that concert (in addition to his other jazz photographs) were shown in at least two relatively recent major books: - "Bob Wiloughby - Jazz in L.A. " published by Nieswand in the 90s (which included a bonus 30x45 cm poster of that very photograph. That huge oversized coffee-table folio cost huge money in the 90s but I did not regret shelling out for it) - "Bob Willoughby - Jazz Body & Soul", Evans Mitchell Books (UK), 2012 (also published in French by Editions Milan in 2013) Some sources say LIFE featured the photo in a feature story in 1952, and one photograph from that very concert (of teenagers screaming wildly) made it into the important worldwide "The Family of Man" photo exhibition of 1955. So Willoughby's photographic documentation of that concert did leave its mark. Like Dansgoodstuff said .. Things were never as cut 'n dried ...

Obviously classic R&B (not its evoutions into soul - not soul jazz where you had yur sax men too) HAD passed by the time 12in LPs were the most widespread media. But there were lots on LP reissues of 40s/50s sax-led R&B recordings throughout subsequent decades of the vinyl era. They covered a wide field and lots of artists but obviously these were no comprehensive at all (but this would have been an impossible task- both in view of the time and the existing market and of the huge range of recordings). But there were enough to keep the buyers busy ... Starting with period items such as this one (with a cover to match ) https://www.discogs.com/de/Various-Saxomaniac-Sax-Sounds/release/3513041 (predating, in a way, the reissues from the Apollo Catalog on the "Honkers & Bar Walkers" LP & CD releases), there were many more, partly by the majors (the "Atlantic Honkers" 2-LP set, "Honkers & Screamers" in the Savoy Roots of Rock'n'Roll twofer series), but also on various collector labels such as P-Vine (Japan), Riverboat (France), Swingtime (Denmark/UK), Oldie Blues (Netherlands), Queen-Disc (Italy), Ace as well as Flyright (UK) which reissued V.A. compilations, or Saxophonograph and also Whiskey Women and ... (Sweden) or Official (Denmark/UK) which featured individual artists (including one by Big John Greer on Official, for instance).

So I just checked my Leadbitter/Slaven and find that except for his two final sessions on King in 1956 (6 tracks - how many of which may have been ballads?) there is just his very first sesion (the one you allude to - for SIW in 1948), and his ENTIRE other output was for RCA (Victor or Groove). which does not leave much non-RCA room. I did not check the entire contents of that new reissue but just compared the tracks listed in the sales text above - and most of these were the same (a pity because according to Leadbitter/Slaven he recorded some 60 tracks for RCA - enough for 2 CDs without too many overlaps. Or is there that much dross?) Anyway ... it looks like a comparison would be a good thing to do for those who already own the Rev-Ola CD. I am not quite sure ... I'd rate the comparatively early post-war Earl Bostic high among those 40s/50s R&B sax men but am less sure about all those Bostic LPs that King released on him throughout the 50s and early 60s (sometimes newly recorded, sometimes recycling earlier-recorded items). I like most of of those I've heard (which are not nearly all) for what they are but they do tend to be a bit formulaic and more pop/r'n'r than more straight-ahead R&B. A bit like where Sam The Man Taylor veered off with some of his 50s MGM recordings.

This CD seems to duplicate a lot with the Big John Greer "I'm The Fat Man" CD on Rev-Ola Bandstand (CR BAND 17) from 2007. At least most of the tracks listed in the above description also figure on the Rev-Ola CD. So anyone owning this CD ought to compare the track listings first. I also wonder if the new Jasmine CD will be a a "real" CD or a CD-R.

Not the Bob Moore of "Mexico", then?

Remember Musidisc is a FRENCH label. "D.R. " (an abbreviation I initially was a bit puzzled about too back in those 70s) means "Droits Réservés". That's the same thing as "Copyright Control" that figures as the composer credits for "traditional" or "public domain" tunes (or tunes where the actual songwriter/composer is unknown) on many English-language labels (mostly UK if I remember correctly). As for incorrect identificatin of the venue on the sleeve - yes, Musidisc was bad on that (and they were far from the only label of that type that got the dates wrong) but OTOH it was the first and only label that made THAT much music available to us over here at that time. And often they just recopied incorrectly what had been botched up on earlier "grey market" releases that Musidisc had recycled (such as certain Alamac LPs, for example).

Ack Värmeland du Sköna? Bought a 78 of that very recording the other day where the tune is listed as "Standanavian". Nice play on words but not an indicator of the composer, of course. And FWIW, it IS credited as a "traditional" on the label.

I can only second (or third or whatever) what everyone else said. Hang in there, Allen, I'm crossing my fingers for a full recovery that will happen as fast a humanly possible. Your contributions to music matters are needed very much.

Just one remark abut Scott DeVeaux' "Birth of Bebop" book: I bought it when it came out (despite the hefty import price) and enjoyed reading it a lot as it covers one of my core periods and styles of interest in jazz. BUT - what's that grossly inflated amount of space allocated to Coleman Hawkins? Much as I enjoy all his 40s recordings and realize he had quite a few of the "young turks of Bebop" working in his groups at various times, isn't that rather a lopsided description of 40s jazz (and its protagonists) as it evolved into bebop/modern jazz? To me this somehow detracts from the overall impact of the book as IMO it seems the author has an agenda that goes beyond the historically balanced presentation of the facts and I would not be surprised if in some circles this would lower its credibility as a reference source. What would you, Mark Stryker, as a renowned author have (or like) to comment on that aspect of the book? Yes, and one minor detail about the online version of your (very interesting) story. The reissue label of McGhee's Dial recordings is Spotlite. not Spotlight.

IMO his Savoy recordings of 1946/47 are just as essential.

Amazing ... As I explored the styles of jazz jazz more or less chronologically from when I started buying jazz at the age of 15 in 1975 my cutoff date of my own purchases was just the other way round ... Anything past 1956 would need a LOT of careful scrutinizing and listening in lest I fall into the sinkhole of too far-out post-bebop modern jazz or even free jazz ... (remedied since, of course, but the preponderance of my stylistic preferences has remained ...) I was 16 or 17 when (during a high school class stay during Easter holidays in London) I bought the 3-LP UK Vogue LP set of the "Clifford Brown in Paris" 1953 sessions at a record shop virtually next door to where the Bloomsbury Books Shop run by John Chilton' wife Theresa used to be. I cannot recall what made me spring for Brownie at that time but I did not regret the purchase one bit and have not looked back since with other Brownie purchases. +1

From what I've read about Tal Farlow he must have been a very easy-going and pleasant guy.

When you said you googled the guy and found he had done that album, how did you arrive there? No hook or detail that would get you started in remembering the name?

So you actually have the name (and this is a riddle) or not?

If so, this is the one. https://www.discogs.com/Duane-Tatro-Duane-Tatros-Jazz-For-Moderns/master/767106 The DB review gave it 2 1/2 stars. Nat Hentoff found it "exercises being worked out, sterile, often cold ..." I remember it being more interesting than that (IMO) and - Nat Hentoff or not - found the review to reflect tastes of the times in certain circles that were a "period thing" but not everlasting gospel. But will have to pull it out again to listen.

Jazzbo Collins.

Sunglasses and goatees make you age in record tempo!

Amazing to see how often this photograph has ben recycled. Below: Top - cover of JAZZ HOT, January 1960 (the original issue of that pic), bottom - cover of SOUL BAG special issue with John Lee Hooker discography (published in October 2001) Does the ACE booklet cedit the photographer (Jacques Demêtre)? Hope they pay his estate the royalties due.

Credit goes elsewhere too. This photograph has been reprinted often. The "Black Beauty White Heat" book (first published in 1982) also indicates the two unknowns are Eddie Robinson and Little Benny Harris (p. 319). So credit goes there.

I don't have the full picture to judge this either but I would not be surprised one bit if you were right.

An interesting discussion, but - apart from the fact that it has led FAR away from the question of the validity of the original "best" listing (debatable at any rate), it may not lead to any consensus just because there are SO MANY differnt stylistic islands of jazz that really ARE islands today because the common ground (that may have existed up to the hard bop era) just isn't there anymore with all that is lumped in under the "jazz" tag today. @Rabshakeh: Since you brought it up: What DO "Rare Grooves" as a genre in itself mean to you anyway? I am certainly a bit older than you (and in the opinion of some may have "old fart" jazz tastes ) but when i became aware of the "Rare Grooves" bins in the record shop at the time this category all of a sudden was all over the place I browsed them casually here and there - and you know what ... my basic impression (apart from the fact that some of them indeed were a sort of DJ playlist sampler) was that many were just compilations that included tracks a wee bit off the trodden paths of the too well known. But to those in jazz who took a passably deep interest in the jazz style in question those "grooves" cannot have been all that exceedingly rare either. (Ha, are they part of the "expert level jazz audience", then? ) So those "Rare Grooves" merchants seemed to have lived on the fact the "Rare Grooves" listeners were fairly clueless in what there was in recorded jazz after all. A bit like with Northern Soul, another category that seemed to have been made up form a similar background. DJs from Northern UK club bases making up their playlists of fairly rare stuff. But rare enough for other soul collectors? And a misnomer in that it had nothing to do (except by geographic coincidence of the recordings) with Northern (e.g. Detroit/Motown)-based Soul as opposed to "Southern" (Stax/Memphis, for example?) Soul? All in all, marketing tags - yes, but styles of jazz??

Don't you know that Sonny Stitt had always been accused of just having been a Charlie Parker copycat? (Despite assertions that he had come to his ideas and style on his own and had the basics of his style set before Bird exerted any further influence - something which we will never know for sure one way or another - but REALLY "one way or another" - but the benefit of doubt did not apply to him, it seems) So THAT accusation alone at THAT time would have done him in with many on the scene.

While I did not find that Guitar Genius album really "free", actually my impression upon relistening to it now for the first time in years is "freewheeling" ... I see what you mean about "incoherent", though. But then I cannot judge his overall output because I have a selectin of his 50s and early 60s recordings (including the 1962 date on Mole Jazz) but that's just a smattering and the Guitar Genius CD is "the odd one out" in what I have ...

Just out of curiosity: How would you rate this one (below) overall, then? https://www.discogs.com/de/Ren%C3%A9-Thomas-Guitar-Genius-/release/7848730

I think this was common practice wherever someone attempted to make an even faster buck by widening its sales appeal with a sort of "generic" artist credits than would allow the buyers' imaginations to run wild (and be fooled ). The 1957 Wolfgang Lauth session (that I mentioned in an earlier post in this thread) that ended up on the obscure U.S. Pulse label (though recorded in Germany but never released here) was credited to an imaginary "European Jazz Quartet" (maybe trying to trick Stateside buyers into believing this was "Europe's Answer to the MJQ"? ), though at least the musicians were identified correctly in the liner notes. Not to mention the fanciful credits (or no-credits) on budget labels such as Crown ...