Big Beat Steve

When I first saw this thread I was wondering long and hard if Red Rodney was "early" enough (even from today's vantage point).

Avid Entertainment - (P) and (C) 2017 Avid Ltd. Compiler: Colin Davey, Remasteirng: Nick Dellow, plus the standard wording of "All rights of the producer and owner of the recorded works reserved" No mention of RCA.

I still feel these are two totally different kettles of fish - if only because the way you source your material means you follow a different approach. This skews the discussion.

I have no way of knowing for sure but my guess is that such a (P.D.) label did use vinyls for the transfers (how would they haved had access to master tapes?) but that they also did some relatively thoughtful remastering on it.

Ace is NOT a "public domain" label, neither is Bear Family. They DO license stuff and Ace, in particular, has ACQUIRED entire label files and archives lock stock and barrel (e.g. the Modern/RPM catalog) and has gone where no others have bothered to tread. If a discussion such as this was to evolve along halfway serious lines this distinction ought to be respected and adhered to. Just because a label is European does not mean it is "Public Domain". And "Public Domain" by European laws and standards is not intrinsically bad. As for the sound harshness and loudness issue, I have a feeling this is a problem even with totally "legitimate" reissues these days. Seems like many reissue companies are bowing too rapdily to what they perceive to be "today's" listeners' "habits" and expectancies. I seem to remember more than one discussion about some Blue Note RVG rmeasterings under that angle too. FWIW, I for one am largely satisfied with Fresh Sound (disregarding for now that they did/do have licensing deals for part of their reissues too) and their offshoots such as Blue Moon, partly because they too go where others never bothered to go (because visibly there was not enough money in those areas for them). Generally I find their sound OK, quite acceptable, whatever .... On a different aspect, I have come to be fairly dissatisfied with the "2 LPs on one CD" reissue/pairing policy of Fresh Sound because they very often pair an easily available item with a really obscure item or one that they had reissued earlier with such an obscure one that would be new to the reissue market. So those who've been around a fairly long time and bought their stuff earlier will often be licked. But I have reached the point where I do not really get too worked up about this anymore. You can't have'em all ... (To put my approach to these PD labels in perspective, when I pay what would be the "full price" it is vinyl I prefer. If I cannot get the vinyl at an affordable price (which these days is often the case, unfortunately) I am much more wary to pay top money for CDs with stuff that is just being reissued in an x-th iteration) I had no qualms about picking up a scant few items on LoneHillJazz either - including for the reason of them covering fields nobody else did (obscure Japanese reissues maybe available on the worldwide market for something like 12 minutes and 43 seconds before going OOP don't count ) As for Real Gone Jazz (the "Classic Albums" 4-CD sets, I've picked up a few of these and can live quite well with the sound too for what they are and how they are priced. I tend to see them as convenience packages and introductory starter sets (this is how I approached some Jimmy Smith and Shirley Scott sets) or gap fillers for items otherwise hard to come by, and they do serve their purpose well in that field. For example, I picked up the Tal Farlow package because though I have spent a fair bit of dough on picking up his individual albums (including some originals and some Japanese reissues) there were three in the field that just eluded me at the prices I was willing to shell out. So given the price of the 4-CD set, this package was well worth picking up even for only 3 LP's worth of ALL-new stuff. When I had a fit of stocking up on Soul Jazz 2 years ago I got myself not only a Real Gone Jazz set on Gene Ammons but also his "Prestige Collection 1960-1962" 4-CD set on a label called "Enlightenment" (his vinyls had largely disappeared from the usual outlets here for a long time). I remember I was a bit underwhelmed by the sound but I will have to do a sort of listening comparison between both (they duplicate one LP) and the very few OJC vinyl reissues I have. JSP im my opinion is a can of worms. I do not have enough of them across the ENTIRE spectrum to judge fairly, but I have several of really early cajun/hillbilly and blues sets with recordings from the 20s that, while I am very tolerant of background noise of reissued 78s really had me wondering "Did all the Paramounts really sound THAT bad across the board?", for example. I can live with it and if in doubt I prefer the noise even of scruffy originals instead of deadened doctorings that lack the high and low ends and just sound flat, but yet I am wondering if any remastering at all was done to these reissues ... The 50s R&B sets I have are OK soundwise, compared to what else is out there in various formats and labels. OTOH the Chet Atkins "Early Years" box (compiled with the assistance of Joe Bussard) sounds eerily clean and "cleaned up" to me. As for Jasmine, those I have are mostly older CDs with reissues of British jazz from the 50s and I wonder if these really all are P.D. or if some reissue licensing deal (e.g. with the successors of the Tempo label) did go into it.

You're all way too fast for me again. TTK, about your ealier question about vinyl sources of the AVID CD, honestly, I am not going to make a definite statement, just try a subjective impression. As I don't have any other versions of the "Adventures in Time" I canot really judge know what exactly they are supposed to sound like in detail, and as the "tonal colors" are all rather different from one track to another it is hard to make sound comparisons as the tunes follow each other. So I did as you suggested and took what must have been the final track on side 1 of the "New directions In Muscic" 10-incher: "Rain" (as it happens) and tried some listening comparison with my vinyl copy of "Inside Sauter-Finegan Revisited" which a reissued many tracks from that 10". My LP is very clean and plays well, but apart from the fact that here (as with many CD reissues) the overall volume of the CD is up compared to LPs and though I'd be quite happy with the LP as it is if I had never happened to buy the CD, I do find the sound of that track on the Avid CD to be brighter and clearer. Hard to describe it in terms that will satisfy the serious musicologists and sound technicians, but the instruments sound more "separate" and more distinctive (you can pick out the brushwork of the drummer more clearly as I sense it, for example), yet they still are "together". The general impression of other tracks goes into the same direction. Whatever it was the remastering engineer did (one Nick Dellow - familiar to anyone?), the results are quite palatable to me. So no complaints from me about this Avid reissue. Re - "Under Analysis", yes of course the LP exists , and IMHO your assessment nails it, TTK (even to me who may be more familiar with earlier big band versions of the standards). Compared to other (earlier) S-F LPs it is a more straightforward version of their "progressive" approach to big band orchestration and charts swinging in a more direct way. Something that even somebody not on an all-out progressive trip shold find fairly accessible (unless, of course, he is dead bent on sticking with typical late 30s "big band era" sounds) The Liebermann Concerto is on the Avid reissue too, BTW, but I have not yet listened to it closer. I'll get around to "Adventures in Time" eventually too but to me it is challenging. It runs a very, very wide gamut - from the cartoon score-ish "The Jukes Family Take a Holiday" (I can very well imagine this as the background music to an animated plot based on the JIm Flora covers of "Sons of Sauter-Finegan" and Nick Travis' "The Panic is On" ) via the dark and decidedly odd rendition of the "The Minute" poem to a background of various percussion sounds (Salvador Dalì's melting clocks set to music? or still more analogies that would be too long go into here) to the lighter-hearted uptempo "Swingcussion" that moves along a bit like what the xylophone-based Red Norvo orchestra of the 30s might have sounded like if he had just kept his early orchestra going and evolving into the 50s without moving his style towards a chamber music setting the way he did from the mid-40s onwards.

Down Beat were sort of underwhelmed. Unable to express the ideas floating in his head and painfully squealing because he was aware of what he wanted to express but couldn't ... Or so they thought ... Just out of curiosity .... Was there more than one Milcho Leviev or a succession/family of musicians by the same name? Unless my memory is failing me really, really badly, I do seem to remember that name from some Down Beats from the 50s (and/or Schwann-like record release listings), but in an orchestral MOR pop/light classics context. Could this possibly be the same one?

But proof too that they were not ABOVE playing such music.

Before anyone else pulls it up:

FWIW, the Mercury LP with the soundtrack of Rock All Night was reissued in the late 80s with the original cover and Mercury label number (MG 20293). I have a hunch this was NOT a reissue done by Mercury (they would not have kept all the original details and catalog no. but mentioned the then current "major" affiliation of the label instead etc.). But whoever reissued this went to great lengths in duplicating the original LP (including the label with the Mercury head and the MG catalog number repated in the dead wax), except the paper of the sleeve. My guess it came from the Netherlands (there were a fair number of compilation or repro reissues of 50s records - basically bootlegs, in the end - from that country that hit the record stalls on the Rockin' scene circuit at that time).

You mean where we approach the center of the disc in the case of the original vinyl, then? I will try to listen closer the next time I spin this.

Honestly - search me. This is something that I can't tell. See my above disclaimer. How would YOU tell on a technical level? (Discounting shoddy bootlegs where you can hear the needle being dragged off the platter at the end of the tune but before the very last fade-out tone has faded out ... - or musings on who may or could possibly have had access to source or master tapes at all)

Centigrades or Fahrenheit?

I do not have a high-end audio setup but I am pleasantly surprised. Last Sunday I spun my original stereo copy of the "Inside Sauter-Finegan Revisited" LP which reissues part of the first S-F 10" LP and did not find the sound bad at all to start with (the stereo doesn't detract) and then, last night, listened to the same tracks (from that first 10") on the CD and found the sound nicely full and bright. They claim on the CD the tracks have been remastered and give a name (not one I am familiar with and I am not at home but in the office right now so cannot check) so my impression is they clearly did some work on these tracks. (Disclaimer : This is just some subjective impression - this is the first Avid CD I ever bought, I am no extreme sound frequency analytics geek and do not spend hours and hours comparing this or that reissue, repressing or remastering of one and the same track for some finicky details but rely on my general listening impressions for what I personally want to get out of the music overall )

Received my copy of the AVID CD containing the Sons, Adventure in Time, Goodman/Miller (and their first 10") albums last night. The Adventure in Time album is heavy stuff (for my listening habits), though, that I need to take (and take in) piecemeal. So please bear with me and be patient ... It's all about percussion, reminding me of the Persuasive Percussion and Provicative Percussion albums in places, but more ambitious still ... As for the Sons of S-F, a first listening-in confirms what Larry Kart said above, though I don't find it quite that "marginally S-F" only. It all depends which part of the recorded spectrum of S-F charts you approach this from.

Just getting into the details of this one now ... This actually is a reissue of their first 10" album of 1953 (RCA LPM-3115) and also has a few tracks from "The Sound of Sauter-Finegan". The only new track seems to be "Exactly Like You", a "leftover" from one of the sessions that yielded the "Concert Jazz" album. Some of the contents of this will crop up again on "Inside Sauter-Finegan Revisited" (RCA LPM/LSP 2473). I am still trying to figure out your angle as I do not seem to be able to grasp it all yet. But that moment will come ... One remark anyway about your review of "Stop! Sit Down! Relax! Think!" My reaction to listening to this one right now (for the very first time for ages) was totally different. It certainly is no Glenn Miller novelty (unless you lump in any danceable white big band swing under "Glenn Miller"). Miller may have been there if he had been around after 1944 and active in the 50s, but do we know? And vocal novelties IMO start a bit farther down the line. To me it is a surprisingly nice example of danceable swing of some more "progressive" (and actually fairly space-agey IMO) 50s style. I'd love to see a few couples of swing-loving dancers do a relaxed, easy going jive or lindy hop to this one but am afraid not many would be hip enough, at least in those circles I am familiar with. Just like "The Honey Jump" (from the "Sound of S-F" album that you unloaded) is an entertaining and danceable period piece even to those who are familiar with other versions of that time (and don't take their music not all that stylistically seriously), starting with Oscar McLollie's original for Modern or the cover version (by one totally unknown called Jody Webb & His Round Up Boys) for the hillbilly market on the Modern subsidiary Flair. I'd rate it as a sort of sauterfineganish equivalent of the Shorty Rogers gang (under the Boots Brown moniker) or the Lighthouse men (on "Big Boy" etc.) having a not quite that serious go at R&B. Both something for hip enough space-agey bachelors to dig if they for once want to get out of their lounge chair and out on the dance floor to move a leg to something more sophisticated and less raucous than real R&B or the burgeoning rock'n'roll sounds of the day. As you can see there is more than one way to approach some of this music even from the points of reference of the times.

Didn't Jack McVea have a VERY long "residency" there? From 1966 into the 90s

I've watched that movie several times (for other period-related aspects than the music score, admittedly) but never noticed that statement. Will have to pull out my video copy again ...

Maybe a bit what the Martians were to Shorty Rogers at about the same time? Not yet - but hopefully soon. (I confess I took the plunge and just ordered a copy of the "Four Classic Albums" CD on Avid the existence of which I discovered this morning when, following your plug of the "Adventure in Time" LP, I did an online search for sources of that album and was pleased to see this CD fills my primary gaps among the S-F albums (Sons, Goodman/Miller) just spot-on. (Yes, I bow my head (somewhat) in shame and promise that when I find affordable vinyl copies of these the CD will go into the car player ... )

TTK, are you referring to Legrand Jazz or to the Demoiselles? I guess it's the Demoiselles and maybe the strictly instrumental version IS way more bearable - but to me much of the singing just came across as rather contrived and unconvincing, maybe because it is evident the actors - and actresses, in particular - just were no singers, including Deneuve and her much too early departed sister (I see only Danielle Darrieux did her own singing). To me somehow their "moves" just didn't match the (overdubbed) singing (not even by the yardsticks of typical musicals, which admittedly I am no huge fan of either) - maybe - again - because this film must have been a one-off excursion into musical territory for most of the actors/actresses.

Watched this film a couple of weeks ago when it came up on TV and found it unbearable and impossible to watch to the end - though I love the period flair/aesthetic of many French movies from the 50s/60s. Michel Piccoli lipsyncing and pretending to be singing - holeee sheeettt! And this was just the tip of the iceberg (but maybe what pushed the movie over the edge for me). It wasn't the fault of Michel Legrand's basic score, though ... BTW, how come nobody has mentioned this one yet? (a 5-ar DB item, IIRC) https://www.discogs.com/de/Michel-Legrand-Legrand-Jazz/release/783641 https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legrand_Jazz

Sounds a bit like what might have been said about Raymond Scott in some circles quite a few years earlier.

Thanks TTK. I am not an extreme S-F fan either but appreciate them and like listening to them every now and then (as to other "progressive" (there's that word again! ) 50s orchestras, and as one part of the overall "50s jazz sound legacy" (if you know what I mean). It seems I approach these reordings not the way you do and am not too familiar with Esquivel anyway but I can see where you come from. And from MY point of view I agree with most of your assessments (though your comments read like I am more forgiving with what you call "corny" whereas on the other hand I was slightly underwhelmed by the fairly straight vocal tunes). As for this RCA series, I do not know how LJM and LPM (that was often used for their jazz LPs in the 50s) related but they must have coexisted for a while. I also have LJM 1018 (Shorty Rogers/Andre Previn - Collaboration - Jim Flora cover too) and LJM 1023 (Barbara Carroll - Lullabies In Rhythm - cover by Oppenheim, not Flora) but this latter one has a black label with colored nipper. I have seen the silver label with the dark reddish lettering on other RCAs but the only one I was able to locate quickly in my collection is LPT 1003 (Bunny Berigan) - i.e. no LJM. So maybe this was just a specific pressing run? According to Bruyninckx, this LP was recorded on Feb. 24-26, 1954, so it is not a collection of previously issued singles and EPs.

I'll be looking forward to it. I wonder what exactly you file under "corny". Maybe some of the (comparatively straightforward) vocals ...? I know some ofthem don't do much for me in this context but I'd consider them a concession to some common denominators among the general public's taste.

I doubt this was typical for "our" generation. It all depends on what style of jazz struck you initially (e.g. through radio) and what you preferred to stay with thereafter. I knew I had no big problems stacking up on the pre-50s styles of jazz (funds permitting), but then the choice was easy in those mid-70s, with jazz rock/fusion on the one hand and avantgarde/free on the other being touted all over the place as what "jazz" (per se) was (supposed to be) all about (and "dixieland" thrown in for the easier listening habits within jazz) you just HAD to go exploring and searching extensively for what immediately appealed to you MORE, i.e. swing in my case (and bop very soon after). And once you started digging you did find stuff. 30s Fletcher Henderson was indeed a bit difficult to get hold of at that time, though. 20s Henderson was easier.