ghost of miles

To one terrific hardboppin' Texan!

Best wishes, JP, and many thanks for the kind words regarding the Duke special--I'm glad you were the one on the board for it in Chi-town.

That photo (and a few others) has been on this board already. Isn't he a friend of a member (Jim Dye or someone) who was in the process of cutting his long hair off? Yep, that's my friend Zach--did that for Halloween one year and has become a kind of Internet mullet-celebrity ever since. Here's some classic motivation.

Nellie Lutcher, a star pianist and singer of the late 1940s who mixed boogie and swing riffs on the keyboards with sly and humorously suggestive lyrics, once remarked that it was 1930s performer Cleo Brown who’d “sort of started a trend for girl piano players and vocalists” with her recording of the song “It’s a Heavenly Thing.” There had been an even earlier, blues-oriented practitioner of the style, Kansas City’s Julia Lee, in the 1920s, but she wasn’t widely heard on records until the late 1940s. Cleo BrownWith the commercial success of singles such as Lutcher’s “Hurry On Down” and Lee’s “King Size Papa,” these performers were able to gain a larger audience, and to showcase vocal and instrumental skills that drew on deeper musical nuance and artistry than their risque hits sometimes seemed to suggest. In addition to Lutcher, Brown, and Lee, we’ll also hear music from singer-pianist Hadda Brooks, a mainstay of the 1940s Central Avenue club scene in Los Angeles. Brooks can be seen and heard performing in Humphrey Bogart’s 1950 film noir In a Lonely Place; in the early 1950s she also became the first African-American woman to host her own television show. Musically she alternated between boogie-woogie (”Swingin’ the Boogie”) and a slow, torch/club-blues style (”That’s My Desire”). All of these artists elevated the profile of women musicians at a time when it was very difficult for female instrumentalists in the jazz world, particularly after the “all-girl bands” of the World War II years had dispersed; by combining their piano-playing with vocals, they were able to enjoy the spotlight of a singer and to put their keyboard talents on display as well. Cats Who Swing and Sing: Women Singer-Pianists of the 1940s and 1950s airs this evening at 11:05 p.m. EST on WFIU-Bloomington and at 9 p.m. Central Time on WNIN-Evansville. It also airs Sunday evening at 10 p.m. EST on Michigan's Blue Lake Public Radio. It will be posted for online listening Monday in the Night Lights archives. Next week: Betty Carter.

New essay up at Dead Caulfields on the uncollected 1945 story This Sandwich Has No Mayonnaise (if you hunt around online, you can find a copy of this and many of the other non-anthologized 1940s JDS stories). This is one of the early Caulfield stories, narrated by Vincent Caulfield (who later morphs into D.B. in CATCHER IN THE RYE); very interesting stuff if you're a Salinger fan.

Just ordered the GLASS BEAD GAMES reissue after reading about it over at Destination Out--sounds like a really fine date.

Victor Feldman also played drums with the Woody Herman Orchestra! Sat in with Glenn Miller's AAF when he was only 10, too, didn't he, Bill? I think I've seen a photo of him with Miller somewhere.

It would not be as extensive or comprehensive, but I'm thinking of doing some sort of Jazzmatazz-type new-releases-and-reissues page or feature on the new Night Lights site....just sounding folks out here to see if there's interest in such a thing.

Two stories about this, both in Gene Lees' LEADER OF THE BAND bio of Herman and in Jack Tracy's notes for the Select. They went ahead and did the session... I was listening to the set and thinking, "Man, that's a melancholic take on 'A Taste of Honey'" and then later read that that was one of the tunes they laid down that afternoon.

Mosaic confirms Jamal Argo box...so sayeth my Night Lights alter-ego. Pulled out CROSS COUNTRY TOUR to celebrate.

In addition to possible lack of $$ being made on the reissues themselves, I've heard (or read--memory a bit fuzzy on this) comment to the effect that the majors have hiked their licensing fees for such projects. (Maybe this came up in discussion of why Mighty Quinn hasn't done much lately.)

I don't think I'm better than anyone. I'm just not going to go through all those threads. Do you know how many threads have been posted here? I'm sure you do. Just change the search from "entire post" to "title." It narrows down the thread results of a search quite a bit.

You and me both. Man, I'd forgotten how great that 1955 quartet album (on disc 1) is.

I'm budgeted out for such a purchase right now--otherwise I'd jump on it. But just wanted to say VERY GLAD to see a post from you here, DrJ.

A friend gave me a copy of this the other day--I've been down (literally) with a cold for the past 4-5 days, and haven't listened to it yet (haven't listened to much of anything outside of a little Ellington and Mobley), but I really liked Jackson's last release and am eager to give this one a spin. Liner notes are by John Litweiler...any posters had a chance to hear this yet? It certainly looks promising.

One of the better jazz bios out there IMO--here's some previous discussion.

Paris Noir: African-American Jazz Musicians in France will re-air this weekend at 11 p.m. EST Saturday on WFIU, at 9 p.m. CT on WNIN-Evansville, and at 10 p.m. EST Sunday evening on Michigan's Blue Lake Public Radio. It is already posted for online listening.

Got an e-mail about this early today and pulled out THE BEST OF TEO MACERO, which Joe Milazzo hipped me to several years ago--intense, "early-avant-garde" jazz/music to be sure. Hope that gets noted along with all of the Miles collaborations.

Marc Myers, who writes the outstanding blog JazzWax, has posted Part 1 of an interview with Sonny Rollins. According to Sonny, there won't be a CD of the Carnegie Hall performance from last year. (Not sure what will happen to the 1957 VOA performance that was supposed to be coupled with it.)

We're re-airing this program this weekend on WFIU at 11:05 p.m. EST as well as Michigan's Blue Lake Public Radio Sunday evening at 10 p.m. EST--and it will also air Sunday on KXOT-Tacoma, WA at 12 p.m. PST--but Say It Loud: Black-Pride Soul Jazz is already posted for online listening. Next week: "The Langston Hughes Songbook."

Story on the AP wire:

Joe, great to see you posting here again! Re: early Joe Henderson, JamesJazz might have some more info...I think he still drops in from time to time.

From Variety:

Ol' A-Bomb Burton? Why didn't we drop HIM on Baghdad?

Man, what with this, and the Kelvin Sampson uproar here at IU, and the revelation that the Patriots had been taping games since 2000...