Fer Urbina

I don't know (yet) when and where can be bought, but I can tell you the book DOES exist Paperback, the back cover says $19.95 and ISBN: 978-1-55128-141-4 302 pp., plus discography and index. As soon as I know more about its availability, I'll let you know. F EDIT to add that according to the website (where apparently you can buy the book), the price I gave is in CANADIAN dollars. Also, AMAZON.CA has it and AMAZON.COM seems to be waiting for more stock.

And to think that Wynton Marsalis and Willie Nelson recorded their album together in "The Allen Room" I generally agree with your approach, Allen, but boy, are you a troublemaker! F

Agreed, Flurin! Same here. I had been looking forward to this set forever. As it's been said, it's probably a matter of expectations, but to hope for a big brassy, muscular band with Mulligan on top and Bob Brookmeyer as best mate, I don't know... I love this set. F

Hi, Have checked. The "other one" was released originally as THE NEW SWINGIN' HERMAN HERD (Crown 205 or 5180, "stereo" or "hi-fi", go figure). Unusually for a Crown LP, it gives the date of recording on the cover: March 22, 1960. No personnel, though. It was later reissued as REAL BIG BAND MUSIC LIVES AGAIN - STEREOPHONIC SOUND OF "THE HERMAN HERD" (Bright Orange X-BO-717). This "second" Herman Crown LP has been actually reissued on CD, by LaserLight (CD 15 775) as CROWN ROYAL, with four added tracks from a different session (live from January 13-16, 1958, Arno Marsh on it BTW, acc. to Bruyninckx - two Gene Roland compositions, Natchel Blues and Ready, Get Set, Jump, plus Don't Get Around Much Anymore and Gloomy Sunday, the latter with a solo by Bill Harris). Although the Bright Orange reissue repeats the same personnel as in the Maxwell Davis Tribute, the CD and Bruyninckx list the following: Rolf Ericson, Don Rader, Bill Chase, John Bennett, Paul Fontaine (tp) Ken McGarity, Jimmy Guinn, George Hanna (tb) Woody Herman (cl, as, voc) Gus Maas (fl,ts) Don Lanphere, Larry McKenna (ts) Jimmy Mosher (bar) Marty Harris (p) Larry Rockwell (b) Jimmy Campbell (d) Ralph Burns (arr) Tunes from the March 22, 1960 session are: Montmartre Bus Ride, Aruba, Darn That Dream*, Crown Royal*, I Can't Get Started, The Grind, Off Shore, Single O, Afterglow, Hermosa Beach*. (*) are the tracks with Lanphere solos according to the LaserLight CD booklet. F (Edit to add the tune titles from the Jan 1958 session on the Laserlight CD)

Can't check right now, but IIRC there are *two* Herman albums in this series. F

About the names in capitals, I'm fairly sure Don Bagley played bass for Kenton for quite a while (he had his own albums, Jazz on the Rocks for Regent has been discussed in the Eddie Costa thread IIRC). Conrad Gozzo played trumpet with Woody Herman's First Herd (with Sonny Berman, Shorty Rogers and Pete Candoli as fellow section men) and later became a session musician (see this). Pianist Raskin rings a bell... after reading this I think it's because his work at Capitol records. F

The first article on the first ever issue of Names and Numbers (April 1985) is about Maxwell Davies and Crown. The date for the Tribute to Kenton recordings is November 17, 1958. Vido Musso only plays tenor on Sorrento, Dark Eyes and Intermission Riff. FWIW, the personnel on the Ellington album is TP: C Candoli, Ray Linn, A Porcino, Jake Porter VTB: J Tizol TB: Lloyd Elliott, Jimmy Henderson, Dick Noel, Tommy Pederson REEDS: Mahlon Clark, Jewell Grant (as, cl); Bump Myers, Ben Webster (ts); Bill Hood (bars). P: Jimmy Rowles. G: Al Hendrickson. B: Red Callender or Curtis Counce. D: Mel Lewis or Jackie Mills. VOC: BB King. Rec. in LA, Jan 12-14, 1960. According to the article, all the "tribute" albums were recorded in LA, except the Woody Herman, which was done in NYC. F

AFAIK the publishers are already sending out review copies. F "Already" - it's only been in the works since 2002. When can us peons get a copy??? So? Stanley Crouch started working on his Bird bio in 1981. :rsmile: F

Next year Blue Note is 70, so get ready for more of this. F

AFAIK the publishers are already sending out review copies. F

Allen, That encounter... did it happen at the crossroads? I am really looking forward to this. I was enchanted by Minstrel to Mojo and by Devilin' Tune, and am really interested in reading whatever Allen writes about the blues. I also think that "the blues" is probably a more difficult matter than "jazz". I got to jazz through blues (and in Spain, reading whatever I could get hold of, which wasn't much nor very good) but I realised very early on that blues was a very vague and often abused concept encompassing anything from the 12-bar, three-chord form to whatever played by a black person with a guitar (Mance Lipscomb's repertoire, anyone?). What Allen says as to the sanctity of the blues is very interesting (his paragraphs about this and Mary Lou Williams in Devilin Tune are ivaluable), and I'd add that turning the blues into a metaphor or some kind of esoteric quality of the human spirit doesn't help understanding its history (if there's such thing, a single history of the blues). For that reason, I don't like Albert Murray's approach on his Stompin' The Blues because IMHO it doesn't help understanding the history of this music, quite the contrary (maybe it's just that it wasn't his intention, but it is what I'm looking for). I should say that I'm heavily against myth-making in history, mainly because it doesn't reflect the real merit of the subjects: Robert Johnson is more valuable to me as a guy from a deprived background who took the time and effort to work on this guitar playing and absorb what had been done before him, rather than someone who went down to the crossroads and became a master musician just like that. Regarding agendas and revisionism, I think that the further you get in time from the actual facts, what you lose in direct witnesses and hard evidence, you can gain in weakening agendas (I'm thinking about Bessie Smith's death). And in the case where the information is thin on the ground, the author can always say it (or say "hey, I'm speculating on this, because right now there's no other way around it"). I also think a mature writer should have at least some idea as to when their agenda is creeping in their writing. Another thing is that IMHO, because of the overwhelming white/black divide in American society not enough attention has been paid to differences within the black peoples of the US, to their class divide or even the geographical differences (was it Willie The Lion Smith who said that the blues started in Harlem?). I think it's a huge mistake to take blacks as a whole, uniform group... how much did Son House and W. C. Handy have in common? Did Handy have more in common with a white music publisher in Memphis than with House? I don't know the answer and I don't know whether there's really an answer, but I think it's the kind of question that needs considering. In any case, whatever music compilation Allen builds for this will be undoubtedly great and it would probably speak louder than expected about the diversity and richness of American music in general. Speaking of blues, bear in mind that Bird's "Relaxin' At Camarillo" and T-Bone Walker's "Call It Stormy Monday" were recorded just a few months apart. That's the kind of mix I'm looking forward to. F

To me his work with Woody Herman's First Herd is his best. Not only for the Caldonia trumpet passage, but for Blowin' Up A Storm, Wild Root and, especially, The Good Earth. What a trumpet section they had... This is from Bill Crow in his Allegro column: F

Biopics are like buses... just read in Ricky Riccardi's blog that Quincy Jones and Charles Dutton are working on a 6-episode miniseries for HBO. http://dippermouth.blogspot.com/2008/09/lo...rongon-hbo.html and http://dippermouth.blogspot.com/2008/10/an...trong-film.html F

I like what he does with the theme of Move http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4tG7929O3I. He may be 90, but not the oldest surviving member of the group: John Levy, on bass, is 96. (Chuck Wayne on guitar, Don Elliott on vibes, Denzil Best on drums). F

Set received - THANKS ALEC! :tup F

Completely unrelated, as far as I know. Disconforme is a group based in Andorra allegedly. Definitive and Jazz Factory are part of it. Their reissues not always comply with the 50-year rule (or are straight rip-offs, like what they did with the Early Mingus CD on Uptown). Ocium shut down one or two years ago. They were based in Barcelona (Spain) and did comply with the 50-year rule. F

Correct. No more unlicensed reissues while owned by Universal. Some of their stuff was pretty good. F

Black Lion was founded by Alan Bates, current owner of the Candid label. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Lion_Records As far as I know their reissues were licensed. F

There's a bootleg version of "Angel" with just Hendrix singing and playing guitar with no effects that's pure magic. This man had ears. The BBC Recordings are a favourite (his guitar playing in "Killing Floor" makes me think his brain was wired up differently to the rest of us). F

Well spotted. IMHO it's a mixture of his personality (laid back and easy going), that he was not being particularly interested in building a *jazz* career or somewhat not preoccupied about the extramusical stuff involved in that (publicity, etc), and especially that he became busier and busier as a studio musician. In spite of his age, he had a growing family (three kids) and I gather he was reluctant to travel outside the NY area. I think he was very unlucky with his House of Blue Lights LP being released by Dot, a minor label with little jazz interest. I agree he's magnificent in SHELLY MANNE's 2, 3, 4. I've been told Manne was mightly impressed, and their interplay on "Lean on Me" is something to be heard (possibly my single favourite Eddie Costa recording). A question for Chewy: what do you mean with . Have you heard Eddie playing with Julie London? Where? Thanks in advance. F

We discussed those McKusick reissues a while back here. F

Allen I just received the Mingus and the Blackwell (different thread). THANKS! F

Indeed. I've actually got it. I guess the cheaper set can always be combined with the Fats Waller pages of the IJS site. F

Cannot check at the moment, but IIRC he did a more than decent job with brushes on a very fast I Know That You Know with Nat King Cole in the After Midnight album. Also, he's been reported to be 91 when he died, but have read elsewhere that he was born in 1914. F

Not exactly. The cheaper version is missing one tune from "If you got to ask...". See here. I agree re: booklet, but as a taster of the *music* in excellent sound, the cheaper version is surely unbeatable, IMHO. F