ghost of miles

From my wife, the following: Miles Davis, COMP. JACK JOHNSON SESSIONS Benny Goodman, PLAYS EDDIE SAUTER and PLAYS FLETCHER HENDERSON Buddy Rich, MERCY, MERCY ...probably more when I see my family tonight. Jazz CDs are practically all that I ask for these days.

Benny Goodman, PLAYS EDDIE SAUTER Charlie Mariano, CHARLIE MARIANO SEXTET PLAYS Dave Pell Octet, PLAYS IRVING BERLIN Miles Davis, JACK JOHNSON SESSIONS (disc 1) Claude Thornhill, AUTUMN NOCTURNE Donald Byrd, A NEW PERSPECTIVE Duke Ellington, FIRST SACRED CONCERT Warne Marsh, STAR HIGHS Curtis Amy, MOSAIC SELECT (disc 3) Replacements, ALL FOR NOTHING/NOTHING FOR ALL Dream Syndicate, DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES R.E.M., MURMUR ... and lotsa holiday jazz.

Going up to my parents' house in Indianapolis as soon as my shift here at the radio station is done. Today's playlist: Duke Ellington, THE FIRST SACRED CONCERT (all of it!) Donald Byrd, "Christo Redentor" Mary Lou Williams, "Anima Christi" Norah Jones, "Peace" Charlie Hunter, "Christmastime Is Here"

THE LEMON DROP KID gets watched religiously around our household come Christmastime. My wife sings in the choir at her church's Christmas Eve service; I pick her up around midnight, and we always go home and watch A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1951). MIRACLE ON 34th STREET and IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE usually get a viewing around this time of year as well. I really wish that CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT would make it to DVD so that we could throw it into the mix as well. And my wife has a special weakness for MR. MAGOO'S CHRISTMAS CAROL.

More bad Santas:

Thanks, man, I knew I left that lying around somewhere! Could ya drop it in the mail for me, maybe w/a piece of paper wrapped around it so that the mail clerks don't see?

I'm extremely grateful for your presence here, John, and not just for your political input, but for your interest in modern improv music as well. Keep up the good work in all of your endeavours, and happy holidays--whenever I finally get out to the great Pacific Northwest again, I fully intend to look you up.

Those of us who attended college in the mid-1980s will possibly remember this stellar moment in the history of cinema: Some friends of mine & I got blotto one Friday night and went to see it when it came out... CITIZEN KANE it ain't.

I'm curious about this as well, Chris. The last time I placed a Daedalus order I bought the Don Ellis title from this label, after determining that it was the the OOP Candid material. Mysterious, though. They seem to be offering a lot of repackaged Candid music.

Thanks for the feedback, gents. I'm getting the book out of the library this afternoon, but in the meantime I think I'll go a-huntin' for a copy of 110th St. It's always a pleasure putting together programs like these.

... and we do have a copy. Supposedly this book contains a fairly decent discography that covers J.J.'s film/TV work. Did he write the theme to "Starsky and Hutch," or did he score it?

Fellow jazz proles, I'm doing some research on J.J. Johnson for an 80th-anniversary special and wondered if any of you know of currently available compilations which feature any of the music that he composed and/or scored for film and television in the late 1960s and the 1970s. I'd like to include at least one track in the radio program that I'm putting together. I'm hoping that our music library here has a copy of this book, which should make my search it a bit easier.

Oh, pardon me Guvnor, I shsee... ya drink from 'a hat affer ya get the keg. Sometimes I get 'ese things backwards! B) I passed many a hat back in my prime drinking years. And I note that this board has now passed the 90,000 mark, with little fanfare... If I had a dollar for every post I made on Organissimo, I'd be, uh--I'd be posting even more!

I used to work a second-shift (4-midnight), but have recently switched to a more conventional 9:30-6 p.m. shift on most days. I actually think I prefer working second-shifts... I like coming home & listening to jazz and/or reading till about 3 in the morning. Ever since I started working this day-shift I've fallen into a pattern where I conk out on the futon in my study around 11, get up an hour later and stumble into bed where I sleep until 2, then get up and read for two hours before falling asleep again. My wife is a tolerant soul & a sound sleeper, but sometimes I think she finds it disconcerting... esp. when I fall asleep in my study first. Is this a guy thing or what? My mom used to HATE it when my dad fell asleep in the living-room Laz-y Boy at night--some serious tension there! In any case, my habit of consuming coffee in the evening probably doesn't help matters either.

Very sad news indeed. I picked up FOR LADY on Joe Milazzo's board recommedation sometime ago and have enjoyed it greatly--I'm sorry he didn't get more of a chance to record.

Not only is faith often not enough--in some instances it's far too much.

I'm surprised that the Scientologists never got to him.

Jim, I don't remember, but I'll check when I go home tonight. They probably did, as they discussed evangelism at great length. In some ways that's how modern-day media evangelism got its start, through border radio. It's also why the Mexican government eventually shut it down, by passing laws in the mid-1980s that required most or all programs to be broadcast in Spanish. (I think they felt that the carpetbagging evangelicals had worn out their welcome, and that Mexican radio should be targeting a Mexican audience rather than an American one.)

For more on radio craziness--particularly Tex-Mex south-of-the-border shenanigans--check out the following book, which was OOP for awhile before resurfacing in a new edition last year: This book covers everybody from the Carter Family to Wolfman Jack--great for anybody interested in vintage country, as a number of country musicians got national exposure via border radio. The infamous "Goat Doctor" John R. Brinkley is a key player as well: he purchased the Mexican station XERA to broadcast ads for his, uh, "practice," which consisted of transplanting goat gonads into men as a means of re-invigorating their libidos. (The Viagra of its time!) XERA got up to 500,000 watts and then eventually 1,000,000; it used to overpower NBC's signal as far north as Chicago. Birds that flew too close to its tower were "cooked," to put it lightly. A far cry from Clear Channel, this history.

And tell 'em SANGREY SENT YA!! I love this CD. They basically edited a number of Dewey's broadcasts into a pretty seamless-sounding show. There's more background on Phillips in Peter Guralnick's two-volume Elvis Presley biography as well. Phillips actually had a TV show as well, but he got fired after one of his sidekicks humped a cardboard figure of a woman on-camera. I think it was an on-air blunder that ended his radio career as well; Dewey (who had developed some pretty bad substance-abuse habits) said, "Hold on, Phillips, that's not the right request... I got a morphine shot in me and I can't see too well." "It's Friday, tomorrow's pay day and bath day, that's a good deal." It sure is!

I'm no fan of McDonough either. His observations here do seem to play into very old-school (as in 1930s) jazz critic tendencies. The box OTOH is indeed great. Just picked up a couple of Grammy nominations, too, including one for Loren Schoenberg's liner notes (which are illuminating, as usual).

We're jes' plain, simple, ordinary DJ folk around here (southern Indiana) for the most part. The community radio station has a few--the Kentucky Kid, Travis T., a duo called Gus and the Old Professor... I sometimes fantasize about broadcasting a late-night jazz show from some remote Olympic Mountains station as "The West Coast Ghost," but right now I just go by my own name. When a friend of mine & I did a vintage show together a few years back I invented a character named "Hawtooth," a backwoods fellow who delivered addled commentary on current events... It was sort of a parody of infamous sidekick characters.

Clem's right on target re: Bear Family. As much as I dig Mosaic, Bear Family's production definitely ups the ante... A couple of friends of mine have all of the ones Clem lists above and swear by 'em. These are the ones I have so far: Carter Family King Curtis Louis Jordan Julia Lee Nellie Lutcher Songs for Political Action (various) Tennesse Jive (various) and a big rec for this one: Nashville Jumps (great collection of Nashville R & B indie labels from 1945-55, with people like Phineas Newborn and John Coltrane popping up on some tracks) Ones I'd like to get include Piano Red and Songs of the Depression... fantastic label without a doubt.

Up for a reminder... out soon!

Speaking of Argo (I think), is Sonny Stitt's BURNIN' anywhere to be found these days?