Kevin Bresnahan

I can certainly hear George Coleman in Alexander's playing but Alexander just sounds different to me. He hits certain notes and I can tell it's him. He seems to glide along the notes more than George, who seems to chop off his notes more abruptly.

I did forget that one, which may be because I actually don't own it. Re-reading the blurb about this release found on the label website: https://www.giantsteparts.org/news/2019/3/5/eric-alexander-leap-of-faith-release where it says, "He has rarely played in, and almost never recorded in, a chordless trio setting. It also marks the first time, in a discography that counts more than 40 releases, that Alexander has recorded an album consisting solely of his own original tunes," I see that I mixed up the parts about "original tunes" with "chordless trio setting". Mea culpa. I ordered it as I am interested to hear what a Jazz Times reviewer calls a "freer, rawer, more searching, more relentless" Eric Alexander. While that may be true, I can still call a Dex tune in 2 or 3 sax notes, be it from 1962 or 1979. Dex was Dex all the time. Having said that, Eric Alexander is one of the few modern tenor players where I can usually tell it's him in 4 or 5 notes.

Eric Alexander's latest, "Leap Of Faith" (Giant Step Arts) was issued May 17th. It's a first for Alexander in that it's a trio recording. Sample here: I think it's only available directly from the artist at this time: https://www.ericalexanderjazz.com/leap-of-faith-1/leap-of-faith

LP version: https://store.craftrecordings.com/collections/panart-records/products/the-complete-cuban-jam-sessions-5-lp-box-set

Me too! In fact, I love buying those commemorative sheets. I bought a bunch of these ones with tropical fish: And this one:

I know exactly what they're talking about. Look at Amazon's digital music offerings. Who makes money off of an album like this one: https://www.amazon.com/Hank-Mobley/dp/B0048W7H0M/ref=sr_1_14?keywords=hank+mobley&qid=1558553938&rnid=2941120011&s=dmusic&sr=1-14 ? I'll tell you who - Amazon.

It looks like the market correction I talked about was in 1988: https://www.nytimes.com/1988/07/24/style/stamps-just-how-much-should-it-cost.html The gist of it is that most dealers were buying stamps at "50% of Scotts" and when Scotts adjusted their value to reflect what dealers were actually paying, dealers still said "50% of Scotts". I actually had more than one dealer offer me less than face-value for a majority of my stamp collection. I finally said, "If they're worth less than their value as postage stamps, I'll just use them for postage". It made for some cool mail back then. One thing I couldn't mail were those postage due stamps. I had a bunch of those because I found out that my local post office had old, old stock. I thought they might still have value. Nope. Not worth much over face. It was a bummer. I should have stuck with coins like my brother. He made a bunch of money when he sold his coins.

Googling NEA Jazz Masters brought up this really great story: https://www.joealtermanmusic.com/new-page-1 It's a great read. Most telling was when he was talking about Yusef Yateef just before he took the stage. He wrote that he looked "very thankful that he, and especially he (an often underappreciated and under-recognized, yet more than deserving jazz master) specifically received this award before it was too late".

Do you know why they don't choose the full number of deserving Jazz honorees each year? It seems strange to me that when choosing from an ever-aging pool of Jazz superstars, they choose to defer. Mabern is 83. Wyands is 90. Kuhn is 81. These guys are most likely not going to be around much longer. Why wait? Do they figure that if they die, they saved some money (that was sarcasm).

No money for the DB Hall Of Fame. NEA Jazz Masters is $25,000. I'm sure these Jazz masters would all appreciate that.

Well I certainly wouldn't even have to think about looking up Mabern or Wyands or Kuhn.

You look up every odd name you see in a tune title? I don't. I didn't even know Dorthaan was a real name.

I stopped collecting stamps decades ago. I used to have quite the collection too. I think I sold it shortly after the whole industry went nuts when the Scotts price guide devalued nearly every stamp one year. They killed the value of most collections. I think I used most of my later stamps for postage, which is the only way I use postage stamps to this day.

Nice tune. I haven't heard that in while.

Thank you for the correction - I mis-read where the adjective was being applied to McFarrin and thought it was her. However, I still have never heard of her, no matter how much she has done for Jazz in the world. I am not downplaying her influence or her contributions. It's just that I have personally never heard of her and at this point in my life, I thought I'd heard of most. On the flip side - I have heard of Harold Mabern... and Richard Wyands and Norman Simmons and Steve Kuhn. On top of all this, it bothers me more when I read that up to 7 artists can be elected each year and yet they never do, which results in the situation we're in now.

Harold Mabern should have gotten this a long time ago. This bugs me. While I'm sure Dorthann Kirk has done great things for the Jazz world and a well deserved nominee, this is the first time I've heard her name.

You don't have the Verve Elite Edition CD? It adds "Cats Vs. Chicks" to Clark Terry's eponymous LP. Well worth finding.

If that's Tubby Hayes, he was a lot thinner than I thought he was.

The Go Fund Me account is up to $206,530 and that's after it had $30-50K withdrawn a few days ago. I hope Kenny & his wife can climb out of their financial hole with this money. Having never seen a Go Fund Me fundraiser succeed so well, I don't know how they "end". Obviously, they've dramatically exceeded their $100,000 goal. Does it stay open until the donations slow down and stop? Don't take this question the wrong way - I'm not complaining. I am very happy that Kenny and his wife are getting the financial help they need. I'm just curious is all.

From the All Music write up: "He only plays the contrabass sarrusophone on "Mandy, Make Up Your Mind" (which in 1924 had the only other recorded sarrusophone solo) and his playing falls short of Sidney Bechet's maiden effort. "

So it sounds like a subcontrabass saxophone was never made? If so, then Robinson plays the Contrabass saxophone on this one: Not my favorite sound. Sounds like painful flatulence.

Robinson plays a Contrabass Sarrusophone, which I think is the same instrument that the picture above calls a "Subcontrabass", on this:

He is always an employee. If I drive onto my company's property and get injured, it's their property that matters, not why I was there. It's like if your mailman falls on your front steps, he's covered under your homeowner's policy. I just think that a workplace injury falls under a different claim bucket. I know that I am asked about every other year if I have any long term injuries that are due to a workplace injury. They have short and long term disability insurance that covers that stuff. I saw where the surviving members of The Doors (Densmore & Krieger) donated over $6K to the fund. I never knew The Doors were fans. That's a cool connection.

It's way higher than that. They already withdrew about $50K yesterday. It got reset to $150K early yesterday afternoon. One thing that I've been wondering... Kenny works at UCLA. Kenny was performing at a UCLA venue. He injured himself walking off stage at a UCLA venue. So an company employee hurt themselves on company property. That's a "workplace injury" and it usually falls into a special insurance bucket - one of those "all expenses paid things". That's the way it is at most companies. They do this to avoid getting sued for the injury on their property. Does anyone have any info on this type of injury?

On the Go Fund Me page just now: Update 1 Posted by Katherine Goodrich-Burrell 36 mins ago A Message from Kenny Burrell Dear Friends, I sincerely want to thank all of you who have donated to our “Gofundme” request. It is very much needed at this time. Your loving gifts have inspired us to become more giving and respectful of our fellow human beings. As God has shown us, when we help others, we also help ourselves. In terms of the music, I am extremely grateful for all of your expressions of love and appreciation. I feel encouraged to continue to do my best. I am also so very thankful for the help and care of my loving and devoted wife, who has worked hard to maintain a decent life for us, despite my medical setbacks and the legal and financial issues we are facing. Thank you, everyone, for helping us get through this crisis. We will always be grateful to you for your love and caring. With much love and good wishes, Kenny Burrell Additionally, they added: Update from Kenny and Katherine: The GoFundMe post described many of the issues facing us, and we would like to specify how your support will help. We will use funds from the campaign to pay for medical expenses related to Kenny's care that aren't covered by insurance. We will also pay credit card bills that have accumulated and become unmanageable. We will use the funds to pay legal bills and put the funds toward any judgment against us, in the event that that occurs. We also will use the funds to stabilize our housing situation, including possible relocation expenses. Again, we are overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support. We cannot thank you enough for your life-changing kindness, compassion, and generosity.