Stompin at the Savoy

High mountain oolong from Li Shan in Taiwan.

A lot of the Lunceford material seems to be on a digital series Verve issued in 2017. Four volumes, four cd's worth of material. The order is different from the Mosaic box and I am not quite sure how the two releases relate but the digital release would appear to be a subset of the Mosaic. Mosaic booklet is here: http://web.archive.org/web/20141207214247/http://www.mosaicrecords.com/discography.asp?number=250-MD-CD&price=$119.00&copies=7 CDs

Judging by the sound and the fact that this came out in 2022, this is very likely derived (stolen) from the masters done for the Mosaic set - The Complete Blue Note Donald Byrd/Pepper Adams Studio Sessions. I was able to get the other two albums on the Mosaic set - Chant and The Creeper - as downloads. Chant in particular was rather nice because Presto had this as a hi res 96 kHz, 24 bit file, which turned out to have incredible detail, esp the cymbals, when listening with the appropriate equipment through LDAC equipped headphones. To complete my poor man's Mosaic, I get the book here: https://musicbrainz.org/release/cc1484c5-c59f-439c-8fe3-a10763ab1b3a/cover-art

I had some of the 7 albums on here. I found it was cheaper to get CD quality FLAC files for the whole set from Presto ($32) than buy the remaining single albums. The mastering is good on this set. Listening to Up and Down at the moment.

Yeah, they are kinda pricey though. I have a Japanese issue of The Procrastinator, which includes the later sessions on some releases of Sonic Boom, so I only need the first session with David Newman and Harold Mabern, around 37 minutes. I am thinking of getting a download. Presto has cd quality for $8.50. I'm retired and have somewhat limited resources, necessitating that I be a bit of a cheapass now... The session with Newman is quite nice and there are a couple spots where Morgan's trumpet work is really marvelous.

Thanks for the correction!

For some reason I never heard this before. It's somewhat hard to obtain on cd.

Volume 5 is on spotify now. As far as I can tell scanning the titles quickly it looks like this volume includes all of disks 3 and 4 of the Mosaic Ellington orchestra set plus 4 tunes with one alternate each from Victor sessions in Sept and Dec of 1933. I was planning on getting the download of this but after listening to the 8 Victor session tunes not on the Mosaic (last 8 tracks) I am re-thinking that. Probably not worth it.

Volume 4 includes all of disks one and two of the Ellington Orchestra Mosaic set. Plus it has a small number of RCA sessions.

Volume 4 includes pretty much everything (as far as I can tell) on the first two disks of the Mosaic Ellington orchestra set, plus a few RCA recordings. I haven't really compared them closely but it seems possible that the mastering is the same or derived from the Mosaic masters.

Wes made a lot of jazzified popular music which I am mostly indifferent toward. He became a musical celebrity and they were trying to make some money out of it, which I get. But when he plays real jazz he is truly great, IMO. His single note soloing is harmonically more advanced than most guitar players IMO. I need to fill in my Wes M collection some more.

The rest of the album doesn't do that much for me but this piece is beautiful.

I don't really see any trend at all. Just depends on who wrote the notes.

I loved those Hubbard CTI albums back in the early 70s. I managed to see him play at the Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach around 71 and he performed lots of tunes from those albums. I had a copy of Jackson's Sunflower LP too.

The youtube clips I checked out aren't quite my cup of tea but they are impressive. She knows something about music and has a fine voice! (Unlike TS). She likes jazz! She's 24 and very talented and probably will eventually come up with some music I would like to listen to.

Sonny Stitt on Verve. Wouldn't that be nice to get the Mosaic treatment? Possibly carve into two or three sets. The three lps with Mel Lewis in 1959 would make a nice Select. Dream on... I did notice that Verve has issued some of their Sonny Stitt holdings as hi res downloads. Possibly that's why no Mosaic.

They roomed together in 1958 or 59. The stint with Monk was around 61, I think. Russell wrote up the theoretical basis for some modal playing, which of course was a focus in the late 50's for Miles, Evans, Coltrane, etc. Evans had worked with Russell and I believe these people were all floating around in the same circles. Edit: oops I guess the Monk period is 57.

Bill Evans, whom Coltrane roomed with for a while. Also George Russell. Coltrane reportedly took some lessons from Ornette Coleman and sent him a check for it.

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Right. Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Nat Cole were actually excellent singers and musicians. There are contemporary examples but I have to say that contemporary culture has in some ways hit a nadir. We live in the age of short-lived viral sensations which have a lot to do with superficial style, hair-dos, glittery costumes and a cult of personality. Thus you have Justin Bieber. I suppose if I make some attempt to generalize what is happening, it would be that popular artists are nowadays often popular for non-musical reasons. I suppose there have always been novelty acts but I think Taylor Swift is a new phenomenon which grew out of Sinatra, Beatles, etc sort of superstardom. There is a bigger package here, of which the music is only a part and sometimes even a pretty small part. The artist has graduated from singer to comprehensive, multi-media show. Jimmy Buffett, the Grateful Dead, etc are a lifestyle, an industry, not a musician or musical group.