mjzee

An appreciation of BE in today's WSJ. Not sure what prompted its printing, but it's a good read: The Bill Evans Legacy.

What Happened to Bob Dylan’s Voice? A Doctor Explains

I've found the capability in Photoshop Elements to correct keystoning. It's Filter/Correct Camera Distortion... or Filter/Lens Correction (depending on your version of PE). Very easy to do, with satisfying results.

PM on: Ammons, Gene Red Top The Savoy Sessions Savoy Jazz Coates, John Jr Tokyo Concert Omnisound Leonard, Harlan and his Rockets 1940 RCA Mobley, Hank Breakthrough Muse

I'll try to go to this one.

One of my favorite albums when I was a kid, "Chicken Heart" still cracks me up:

This is now available from Amazon Resellers for $41.56 + shipping.

The latest upgrade to iTunes has greatly increased the visibility of entry fields under "Get Info."

These ECM artists never seem to play Houston.

The other 2/3 being Ray Brown and Shelly Manne. It is a nice, straight-ahead session. A little short, though, since it was originally a direct-to-disc. But really, you could do a lot worse. (It was probably titled just "The Three" because of contractual reasons re Sample.)

I just do the cheapest shipping option. Arrives via US Mail in about 10 days, no problem here. Wait till you see the way they pack their boxes...pristine.

This is not meant as a retort to Paul's posts, but I found this fascinating. In the new thread about the Blizzard of 2015, Tom 1960 linked to today's Marc Myers's Jazzwax blog, where Myers discusses the Boston blizzard of 1978 (it can be found here). Myers (about halfway down the page) has the lists of what he played during the storm. Note that all the Pop-Rock-Disco titles were current. ALL of the Jazz titles were old, even then. The most recent titles seem to be Stitt's Tune Up (1972) and Herbie's Headhunters (1973). So maybe that's what jazz listeners do: listen to and talk about old music.

What did your cost work out to per CD? With shipping, $68.97 for the 6 titles. (I had about $1.50 worth of points in there too.)

I have one of the Haigs, "Duke 'n' Bird," which I got as an eMusic download back in the day. Nice, almost classical in its arrangements. I suspect that Allen Lowe can speak far more knowledgeably about the music, but I did enjoy it. I placed an order with CDJapan for the Sam Jones, Hank Jones Hanky Panky, the Tristano and The Pentagon. In addition, I got Attila Zoller - When It's Time and Eddie Costa - House of Blue Lights. The new exchange rate is kinda nice.

I heartily recommend the Art Farmer studio albums; this was a great time in his career. In particular, "The Summer Knows" is one of my favorite jazz albums, period. I don't particularly love the "At Boomers" CDs...like too many live sessions of that period, the tunes simply go on for too long, and seem kinda flabby as a result. YMMV. Re the Great Jazz Trio's Village Vanguard sessions: they're all really good, consistently so. There's a really nice balance between Hank Jones's class and classicism, and Carter and Williams's more modern thing and higher energy. They don't let Hank get too sleepy, and he reins in their desire to race off at the tracks. Any thoughts on the Don Friedman and the Ronnie Mathews?

This probably means nothing to most of the country, but a tear must be shed. Joe Franklin, Local Talk Show Pioneer, Dies at 88 - NYT

As I recall from back in the day, the Reggie Lucas and Hubert Eaves titles were a jazz-rock/funky-disco blend that wasn't very distinctive. Certainly nothing like Miles; more like Stanley Clarke wannabes.

Gram Parsons was a bit "pitchy," as Simon Cowell would say. On the other hand, he begat Emmylou Harris, which ain't too shabby. On the other other hand, Mike Nesmith's mother invented Liquid Paper.

Was it this? This was the LP; the other one was the CD.

The secret Sinatra past of Bob Dylan's new album - LA Times

How's the album with Paul Bley?

I saw Sinatra once. Must have been in the early '90's, at Carnegie Hall. He was backed by a 40-piece orchestra and a 40-piece string section. I didn't have much money at the time, but knew I had to see this. Got a ticket in the very last row of the top balcony. It was great. Was Frank's voice shot? Yup. It was interesting, though, that he did much better on the uptempo numbers than he did on the slow ballads. But his poise, his mannerisms, his stage presence, all were right on the money. It was a great evening.

RIP.