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Andrew Hill won the Jazzpar award last year. Winners of the Jazzpar awards are given the opportunity to record an album. Other albums by Jazzpar laureates are listed on this link. Click on CDs to check the various albums: http://www.jazzpar.dk/start.html

Glad to see Organissimo back on its feet! Looks like the tribe is gathering again...

Happy Birthday Hope you're listening to some great jazz!

Some recommendations: the Dizzy Gillespie big band concerts with Chano Pozo: the Paris concert at Salle Pleyel and the LA concert that was released by Gene Norman Presents records. And don't forget the Kenny Dorham 'Afro-Cuban' BN album from the early '50s. The title tells it all and the music is glorious...

French radio which keeps the important news in proper perpsective just mentioned that Thomas 'Fats' Waller was born on May 21, 1904. So happy birthday, Fats Waller. 100-year young and still bringing joy to fans all over the world. Glad to enjoy your music so long after you moved out from our scene!

Don't know what you people are talking about! Never had problems with my 6CD player in the car. I have loved the device. Much better than the cassette players I had in my previous cars.

I'm another veteran here (going to 65). Some may say I qualify to the 'Old Folk' status. I just can't set my mind to the idea. I'm happy 'keeping my mind active', as Art Blakey used to say... I was listening to (and enjoying) John Coltrane when I was still a teenager. Went through all the various jazz developments and follow what the younger musicians bring to this art. Still enjoying the old Coltrane but keeping the ears open for the new Coltranes... I am happy to see the younger generations get their enthusiasm high about the same music I grooved on and bring new and younger names to my attention. I share their passion for the new developments. I may be more picky about this than the younger fans but I am delighted in watching their enthusiasm. One thing I am sure of is that I will not join any of the old folks groups. The old ones may know but the young ones are the doers.

The following sessions seem to be overlooked. They're among the very best BN dates: - Jimmy Smith 'Live at Club Baby Grand' - Fred Jackson 'Hootin 'n Tootin' and last (or first) but not least the Edmund Hall/Charlie Christian Celestial Express sides.

Clem, I'm with you all the way... to the Tour de France (although I have reservations about the quantity of drug-related substances that go with the race nowadays). And Georges Perec not only Lives, he Rules!

I abstained from enlisting in the RDK BFT list for the same reasons as Catesta. Would not have had the time to get into this and contribute. I'm on the Daniel A. list and planning to enjoy that one! Nothing personal, RDK. Just too busy elsewhere...

So you'll be in Beijing in '08? I'll be there.....will you be bringing the cigars and Armagnac? I'll be a happy retiree in 2008. If you want cigars and Armagnac, you'll have to come to Paris to get them. Weren't you supposed to come over this month?? Your good friend Bush is coming to Normandy on June 6. I will be there, too. But no cigars for him and no Armagnac (or Calvados) for him...

Just hope that it's not going to be Paris! The Olympic Games are a pain for the locals who are not involved with them. Besides by 2012, I will be a retired journalist and I plan to watch those Games on TV. I have covered practically all those Olympics since the infamous Munich ones in 1972 and worked at all of them. Involved with photos and been confined to the Press Centers and did not manage to watch a single event of some of the greatest Olympics ever. Plan to change this from now on. Understand Madrid is a very serious contender and their project impressed the Olympic officials. I'm with EKE BBB on this one!

From AP:

Happy birthday, Chuck And many, many thanks for all your contributions to jazz in general and to this Board in particular!

For European film and jazz fans, please note that 'Le Monde' daily newspaper will have a DVD of Jean-Luc Godard's first full length film 'A Bout de Souffle' (Breathless) attached to the newspaper in its Saturday May 22 edition. Le Monde plus the DVD will be on sale for €5 ($6) in France and probably a little more outside of France. 'A Bout de Souffle' remains the best film from the French New Wave. Martial Solal wrote the splendid soundtrack for the film. This is the second time that Le Monde has a DVD with its Saturday edition. Lasr week the DVD was from Jacques Demy's 'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg' and 'Les Demoiselles de Rochefort'.

Can't believe that this mountain of energy that brought so much joy is gone! This is very, very sad... Talk of someone who is going to be missed!

Loved him in Frank Tashlin's 'Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?' where he played opposite the one and only Jayne Mansfield who was more fun than Doris Day (Randall's costar in a number of forgettable films). He will be missed!

Very enjoyable lightweight read: Terry Gibbs' autobiography 'Good Vibes, a Life In Jazz' (The Scarecrow Press'. Had found Gibbs interview in Cadence magazine several years ago very interesting. His book is great with quite an impressive cast of characters. Gibbs has been part of the jazz scene since his early days in Brooklyn with friends like Tiny Kahn, Al Cohn. He has a lot of witty reminiscences and writes a bit like he plays. His style goes in various directions but he knows how to tell a story. Perfect ready for a sunny spring day. Very enjoyable middleweight read 'Les Faux Monnayeurs' (The Counterfeiters) by Andre Gide which I had not got into since my teenage days. Very witty book in beautiful French. Alfred Jarry, the author of 'Ubu Roi', makes a chameo appearance. Gide is brilliant when he moves around his characters and remains a master at describing friendships and solitude. Gide was a Nobel Prize of Literature laureate in 1947. He died in 1951.

What's wonderful about the music on the two sessions is the sense of joy that is felt and heard in the playing of all these musicians throughout the various tunes performed. Love these albums!

Mark ROTHKO! The more I look at his paintings, the more I am impressed by all there is into his art. There was a retrospective of Rothko's work at the Paris Museum of Modern Art several years ago. I had seen some of his paintings before but this was really like 'hearing' Charlie Parker for the first time.

Alan, e-mailed you (PM did not go)

Most of these Definitive albums show up in Paris secondhand stores at a fraction of that cost. I get them for less than $10 each, 4CDs set are up for grabs for some $25 usually. Some of those items (obviously promotion copy for critics who resell them for profit) are available before the albums are up for sale at the full price in the regular stores. I got the Tony Fruscella 4CD set for very little. Already had all the material from the Atlantic, Spotlite, etc. sessions but it was nice to have all that wonderful music in one set.

Hardbopjazz beat me to the story of this omelet. When I saw this, the reaction was 'Damn it's not only the price of gas that's going insane!'. Right now I am posting from the edge of the deep forest of the Landes in southwest France. There is a farm nearby where the chicken run through the grass. Every second day, I call up on the neighbour to pick up a dozen eggs, all day fresh. Best eggs I ever tasted. Standard current meal is an omelet (with the glorious local farm ham). Total cost of the omelet is a fraction of a dollar. I bet it tastes much better than that $1,000 omelet Caviar with omelet may be a rich man's fancy but I doubt caviar adds anything to the taste. If the chef had the right taste for the perfect Omelet he would use truffle instead of caviar!

Yes, that was another Uncomplete set from Mosaic! But the second Hodges box from Mosaic was superb music with quite a lot of new material. Always loved Hodges but this box grows on me every time I listen to it.

Let's face it, there is going to be lots and lots of these reissues. Legal in the EU. Not legal in the USA but obviously available there. There have also been reissues of pre-1954 BN sessions by Lou Donaldson, pre-1954 BN/Prestige sessions by Miles Davis, etc. This has already been discussed to death for the past few years. We all know who's going to be hurt but there is not much that can be done about it. The 50-year music copyright limit is a fact of life. I won't get those BN (and various other small labels) reissues. I already paid my dues. But I look forward to other reissues, like for instance more Errol Garner Columbia sides that Columbia has not managed to reissue properly up to now. Or great sessions from RCA and Decca that these companies have practically ignored.