Dan Gould

I cannot understand letting Rob Refsnyder leave. Do they really prefer a fourth outfielder with more balanced stats? Refsnyder ranks with the very best hitters in the game over the past three years against southpaws and there are certainly some tough lefties in the division and league. A weapon like that ought not to be cast aside, and while his salary doubled, the increase is a rounding error in the context of the entire payroll. Dumb.

+1.

Very happy to share two tunes featuring Percy France and Papa Jo Jones ... I learned a couple of months back that Percy was the last tenor saxophonist to play in Papa Jo Jones & Friends but was so disappointed to not find any recorded examples of those gigs to date. But a WKCR Benefit at The West End is better than none. With Loren Schoenberg (piano) and Skinny Burgan (bass):

Very nice Ken.

That definitely makes sense ... a decent editor would have caught it especially for a book in a Lives of Musicians series.

Thanks for posting - These are the types of cats I love to hear. I need to track it down hopefully Jim has some copies for sale.

Search Amazon by "Listening to Prestige" and they will come up.

One egregious error I've spotted. Joe Albany (piano) is listed with Benny Green and David Hazeltine in a list of younger players who took part in regular jam sessions at a place called the Star Cafe. I mean, egregious unless there was another Joe Albany in NYC in the 80s? Cause Joe Albany was performing as a trio and Joe Albany's New Yorkers at The West End.

I received and have read first 40 pages (covering his early life in Pensacola, first move to NYC, and second move to NYC and tenure with Horace Silver). Easily recommended overall. There are a few statements I'd take issue with or facts that I would have expressed differently (that "Nica's Dream" was first recorded by KB on K.B.'s Blues - yes, but if K.B. Blues wasn't even released until 1979 in Japan, shouldn't that be mentioned?) The author is a saxophonist inspired by Cook. His writing is decent though I think some paragraphs get a little ungainly. He isn't deep into nitty gritty of the music though there are interesting discussions of how Cook compared to Mobley in Silver's band, and then Cook to JoeHen. Put it this way: musical commentary isn't offputting to this non-musician. What this is, so far, is a deeply researched compilation of contemporaneous commentary on Cook supplemented with interviews of people like Cuscuna and others. I am sure it will be the go-to source for those interested in Junior Cook as it brings it all together in one place and has new material as well.

AFAIK Tad did not slap together the self-published Listening to Prestige volumes and call it a book.

I helped the author - providing recordings and photos - so I plan to pick this up probably out of Christmas Amazon gift card. I don't know if it will be at the top of my reading stack but I will post when I get to it. BTW I started a thread in the Jazz in Print subforum.

I just mentioned it because I was reading in the NYT about drones, they answered a series of reader questions about them and one was what about shooting them down. I think it also said that your drone operator has to be in sight of the drone at all times, so how exactly is Amazon doing this in a cost effective manner, I wonder. I mean is it that much easier to pull in a development and dispatch drones for the Last Mile?

Anyone who shoots at a drone is guilty of a Federal crime. You'd be pretty stupid to do that though I imagine that it might be hard to know who did it if you don't also have eyes on the property from whence the shots come.

https://sunypress.edu/Books/L/Listening-to-Prestige Also available thru Amazon and shipping the beginning of January. While I am not finding the thread, his prior effort Jazz With a Beat was discussed here earlier this year IIRC. Definitely a will-buy and sooner rather than later.

I am torn between a standalone article that goes into greater depth - and which I would need interest from a periodical to be determined - versus incorporating the story in a more simplified way into a Percy France profile, which I already have interest from two different publications, Hot House and the Syncopated Times.

So would anyone be up for an in depth article about how Honky Tonk came to be? Next year is the 70th anniversary and it was the first #1 single by an identifiably "Jazz" group (according to Schaap, the only one to match was Louis with "Hello Dolly"). There's also the fact that Percy France insisted that the song started while he was still in the band. So the history is somewhat muddled - and I have acquired a good bit of info in the last week or so (Schaap interview of Doggett and NAMM interview of Shepherd).

If he were, a little late to ask. Well this is an issue of musician recollections anyway ... Shep Shepherd said the tune was tossed off at the end of the session because they needed one more. Doggett is equally certain that the session was for this soon-to-be million seller because he had let slip at a gig in Cleveland that this was his new single, and the local record store had 150 pre-orders, called King, asked for Honky Tonk and was told that it didn't exist. Until then, Syd Nathan was pushing back on the idea of a two-sided juke box single because it would mean two slots out of 50 instead of one - a tough sell to jukebox operators. 150 preorders convinced him that Doggett had a tune with potential and greenlighted the recording.

Hi Andy. Not sure what you mean by "this" but ... as far as the Sidewinder session goes, the title track is listed next to last, not the last recorded released take. To the general question, I am looking into how Bill Doggett's Honky Tonk came to be and drummer Shep Shepherd completely contradicts Doggett's story about a sort of immaculate musical conception on a gig in Lima, Ohio, he says it started during a rehearsal and that some time later the band needed to record another song and Doggett asked the band about that "honky tonk type thing you were playing before" and they recorded it and to Shepherd's surprise, it was a sudden, surprise hit a few weeks later. Ruppli shows Honky Tonk Parts 1 and 2 as the first tunes recorded at their June 16, 1956 recording session which contradicts Shepherd's memory.

Probably a silly question but just to verify, label discographies organize sessions by recording order, right? So if "Honky Tonk" is listed first in Ruppli, it was first song laid down. And I guess, similarly, the log for what became The Sidewinder would show the title track as the last tune since Lee composed it at the very end to get an LP-worth of music done. (Actually looking at the Lee Morgan Discography project page, Gary's Notebook was the last tune recorded. Is my assumption wrong or is the story of how Lee composed it not really true and actually easily controverted by the session log?)

I really need for the Yankees to miss out on Tucker and then see the Mets snap up Bellinger. I'd even take the Evil Dodgers throwing insane money at Tucker until he says "yes" over dealing with Tucker, still in his prime for at least 5 years, in the Yankee lineup.

Stunning news last night (not sure if the news one will be accessible, there was no link to "gift": https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/12/15/us/rob-michele-reiner-dead/rob-reiner-home-bodies?smid=url-share https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/movies/rob-reiner-dead.html?unlocked_article_code=1.808.kTpp._C9XZSl67Blz&smid=url-share His streak of films starting with Spinal Tap in the 80s-90s is pretty remarkable (although I only hate-watch A Few Good Men - a minority opinion but so much of that movie is just awful IMO.)

Been hoping Jomboy would do some older video breakdowns. this is an instant classic 3:47 had me laughing. and Joe West was an a-hole his entire career.

Guess I should have said "historic recordings aside ..." Obviously things like Charlie Brown Christmas and Nat Cole's recording stay in print or get the deluxe treatment. But where is the average jazz Christmas recording that gets reissued?

https://www.tamupress.com/book/9781574419825/have-horn-will-travel/ https://www.amazon.com/Have-Horn-Will-Travel-Musician/dp/157441982X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=ZZ8CKXRKQ5MR&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.S4G-m53Z6cKBKSfueHAcWGSFO1Dqf0I6iQ1uuSgJWr7GjHj071QN20LucGBJIEps.7w7b3-2khXs50zb2qwU_iq5NYEESUF5r0pPBpXRIP_M&dib_tag=se&keywords=have+horn+will+travel+junior+cook&qid=1765134021&sprefix=have+horn+will+tr%2Caps%2C130&sr=8-1 I started conversing with the author after I posted a photo/recording of Junior Cook from the Leonard Gaskin Papers held by the Smithsonian two years ago. Definitely interested in this ...

@neveronfriday Thanks very much for all your posts about Guy.