[Bud Powell Birdland 1953]

As I remember the 1953 Birdland stuff, the february session is just incredible.

Another highlight are the tracks with Bird and Candido.

I think, that even on the last session from september 1953 Bud still had a lot to say, even if he had slowed down a bit. But the live versions of Un Poco Loco are very interesting as a comparation to the 1951 BN date.

[Happy Birthday Mr. Charles Mingus]

It seems that nobody has noticed, that Mingus was born on april 22, so yesterday was his birthday.

I´d like to say, that I listened to a couple of his recordings (Black Saint and Sinner Lady, Mingus Ah Um, Three or Four Shades of Blues).

It was Mingus´music that opened me up, made me listen to stuff beyond bebop and hardbop, so that I could make the transition to the "New Thing".

Strange enough, one Mingus album (Great Concert 1964 Paris) was about one of the first records I heard. Even if I didn´t understand most of it during that time, I kept listening to it over and over again. Dig that, I didn´t even know who Charlie Parker was, so when I heard that "Parkeriana" and read that Parker was something like an idol for Mingus, I decided to get Parkers records. So I might say that Mingus made me look back a n d forwards (back to the roots of bop, of Duke Ellington etc., and the step to 60´s avantgarde....)

As long as I live, I´ll always have to thank Mr. Mingus for his immense contributions on music, he´s one of the real giants...

[Hank Mobley's last session]

It´s too bad it was to late for Hank.

He might have had the same possibilities on Steeplechase, like Dexter had earlier before he returned to the States.

Actually, I was really disappointed when I heard Hank´s last studio album for BN, even 10 years earlier. It sounds weak and uninspired.

I really love Hank, he´s one of my favourites, I even heard that last tape from 1985 or 1986 at the Angry Squire and tried to enjoy something from that, but it´s hard to listen.....

Even Dexter, who at the same time was very sick and had respiratory problems and other ailments, played better on the few dates from the 1985 Movie on, the few occasions when he played a few tunes.....

[Dizzy Gillespie Afro Cuban Experience]

Yesterday I saw them at Porgy & Bess in Vienna.

It was just a wonderful experience to hear those great musicians together. I always had liked John Lee, who was Dizzy´s bass player from about 1985 on (if my memory is right). And of course Ed Cherry, the great guitar player, also with Dizzy from about 1981 on.

The front line was fantastic: Freddie Hendrix on tp an flugelhorn, and Sharel Cassity on alto, they really can blow and did some very very exiting stuff.

And needless to say, the great rhythm team Tommy Campbell and Roger Squitero.

The only downer was, that Machito jr. was to ill to participate. Mr. John Lee announced the public, that Mr. Machito jr. had been rushed to hospital early in the morning, after they had played at Burghausen/Germany.

We all hope he´s well now.

The group played some great tunes, many of them associated with Dizzy, like Toccata , Tin Tin Deo, Fiesta Mojo, Night in Tunisia, and an ultra fast Caravan, and a medium tempo "In a Sentimental Mood" as a feature for Ed Cherry....

I really enjoyed that evening and it made me so happy to see that the great music still is growing.

[Lou Donaldson]

I also thought that Lou´s working band would have deserved to be recorded, especially "live"......

[Art Farmer]

I was lucky I saw Art Farmer very often in my hometown Viena, at least two times every year he was booked at "jazzland".

Naturally he was one of the first musicians I saw live.....

[Lou Donaldson]

Great review, Justin V, just read it and about the same time I also saw LD live.

About his playing mostly the same stuff on all gigs, I wouldn´t blame him for that. He´s 87, 88 years old.

Much younger musicians did it the same way: Mingus "Fables of Faubus, Sue´s Changes" almost on all concerts I saw, Dizzy with "Night In Tunisia, Con Alma , Manteca etc.", Miles Davis during the 80´s each set starting with "You are under Arrest" and then "New Blues", and "Human Nature",, and they were about 55, 60 years old......

[Lou Donaldson]

Strange enough: When I started to get into the music, he was a pretty "forgotten man" and I first saw his name and heard him on record on the BN-LA double LP of Monk "Pure Genius", the 1952 sides you know them.

I think that´s the time he came on the scene, playing with Monk, with Bags and with Horace.

Then, in the late 70´s there was a Timeless LP "Forgotten Man" (smile).

I didn´t really pay attention to him until he was scheduled on a Festival 1985 (Danube Festival). That´s where I heard him first.

During that time he had Herman Foster on piano. From then on, I heard him often and bought many of his BN LPs, though I must admit now, that I wouldn´t have needed to buy so many of them.

Last year (in July) I heard him again. Naturally I didn´t expect anything fresh or new, but I really enjoyed it....

[Name some Blue Note cds you find overrated]

Now that you are talking about Ornette, Cecil Taylor and so on......that´s a big point !

When Alfred Lion started to give avant garde a try and started to record some of the most popular New Thing artists, he did it in his own manner, so when they recorded it, it was more in a way that could be understood by the public.

Like in my case: I came up listening to hardbop, it was my music that I understood, but being a teenager I felt like I might learn some more stuff to get further, more advanced in my musical knowledge.

Listening to the two Coleman albums "Golden Circle", or to Don Cherry´s "Complete Communion", or even to Cecil Taylors "Unit Structures", it was much easier for me to get into that thing, because it was one of Alfred Lion´s principles that even if it might get "far out", it got to get to a point wher it "has to schwing", like he would say.

So, for an avantgarde "newbie", like I was during that time, it was much easier to get into that stuff by listening to the albums that I have mentioned.

It was such a great time in my life, when everything was new and I was eager to learn about it. Like reading books, not only the classics, but the contemporanous authors, poetry, stuff like that....... just a wonderful period in my life, when I was eager to learn about those things, and BN sure helped me a lot during that period.....

[Dexter Gordon]

It´s hard for me now, cause I´m afraid it will be OT, but if you talkin about James Moody and bop tenor, dig his solos on the Miles Davis-Tadd Dameron album from Paris 1949. That´s some first class Moody and very very advanced.

Believe it or not: When I bought that album in (1977), my main man on tenor was Dave Liebman, I still was almost a kid and didn´t know all the guys, Liebman was in town and playin great.

When I heard some stuff Moody played on the uptempo tunes like "Allen´s Alley" etc. , it sounded really advanced with some avantgarde screams, the stuff that had impressed me when I heard the only tenor player I knew.....Dave Liebman.....

Back to Dexter: I´m not sure, but I think Dexter was on the scene a bit earlier. He had started with Mr. B in 1944, and if I´m right, Moody started with Diz two years later.

It´s strange, but Dex got more exposure than Moody. That´s like Diz or Fats, who got more exposure than Maggie, who also was a helluva trumpet player....

[Name some Blue Note cds you find overrated]

Once I collected so much BN, but I couldn´t say I listen to all of them frequently.

Now, if I think back, I wouldn´t have needed to own all Lee Morgans from the 50´s and 60´s the "Cooker" is the best one and I keep listening to it. Or "Search of a New Land", those two are fine, the latter much better than "Sidewinder".

Same with Mobley, with Lou Donaldson, Jimmy Smith. Just 2 or 3 albums from each of them might be enough.

And I almost never listen to the "Three Sounds". That´s some kind of Oscar Peterson imitation. That kind of jazz for people who usually don´t listen to jazz.

I love Wayne Shortes "All Seein Eye", it´s much better than "Adam´s Apple".....

[Dexter Gordon]

Well I think it was Dexter´s highly individual aproach of the bop-vocabulary. He didn´t just play "Diz or Bird" on his instrument. He managed to get his own style, like Bud, like J.J. Johnson, so I consider him one of the main artists of that style.

And he managed to live longer than many of the creators of that style. Like Dizzy, he still was active, when most of the others were dead. Dizzy could play anything, but he didn´t need to play bebop, he WAS bebop. Same with Dexter.

[Tony Williams' later Blue Note albums]

I must admit I really don´t know much about the albums BN made after the label was re-born. It seems that many outputs were short-lived and not as well advertised as the classic BN´s.

So I wasn´t aware Tony went back to record for BN that late.

I really love his two 1964 and 1965 albums "Lifetime" and "Spring", and the stuff he did later with Larry Young and so on. And of course the VSOP.

The last time I saw him life was with VSOP II.

I had heard that towards the end of his life he played in a more traditional manner but I didn´t really follow, there was so much looking back during that time, "New Stars" who sounded very much like the idols, trumpet players who got Miles´ sound from the 60´s , alto players who got JackieMcLean´s sound etc etc, who got record contracts, and later you wouldn´t hear very much about them.

It was the time when I slowly stopped to buy records

[Dexter Gordon]

I didn´t know about the other 7 volumes until recently. Had thought Billie´s Bounce is the last one.

It seems that the next 7 albums were not very well advertised.

Tried to find some of them on amazon now, but not all of them.

But naturally I must get them.

By the way: Yesterday I contiued my personal Dexter festival at home, and listened to another Steeplechase album, the famous "Montmatre Summit" feat. Dexter with Jackie McLean (original album titles: "The Meeting" and "The Source").

[Dexter Gordon]

@caravan: thank you ! Great thing ! Gave me that big big smile, yeah I love everything that Dex did.

and from my present view: Now I like some of that stuff, where older guys mixed their stuff with then "modern" instruments.

During that time I remember their were some bad review, people saying why Hamp played on the electric piano when a good acoustic piano was available.

Now, after 40 years I say I like a lot of that stuff, same with Dizzy, when he went on tour with electric guitar and fender bass instead of acoustic piano and upright bass fiddle.

Now, I love that sound.

And, last not least: Klook is GREAT ! Made me so happy to see him here in action, great drumming !

[Dexter Gordon]

_{I have tried for many years to find that Prestige LP (or better CD) Blues a la Suisse with the same personnel (Hawes on electric piano, Cranshaw on electric bass and Klook on Drums). Never found it.}

I have it as part of the Dexter Prestige box.

Yes, I noticed that. The problem is, I have all the single Prestige CDs, only Blues a la Suisse is missing, so it would be a little to much for me to buy the whole box only for one missing item.

I would have been interested in that record, since Hawes plays electric piano. Not, that I´m a fan of the Fender Rhodes, I love the acoustic piano, but I would have liked to hear how Dexter sounds in that context.....

Anyway: Some interesting Dexter from about that time, also with a mixture of "crossover" or "fusion" musicians and mainstream stars are the two albums of "Montreux Summit 1977" , where Dexter is well featured.

[Dexter Gordon]

_{I have tried for many years to find that Prestige LP (or better CD) Blues a la Suisse with the same personnel (Hawes on electric piano, Cranshaw on electric bass and Klook on Drums). Never found it.}

_{I also listened a lot to Dexter those days.}

_{Mostly to the SteepleChase albums "Dexter in Radioland". They all are great, with one exception:}

_{"Vol. 1, Cry Me a River". Well, the Ballad is wonderful, but I don´t know what Dexter´s doing on "April". I heard so many of his recordings and saw him live so many times, he allways was great even if he had his "cups", but on that "April" from 1962 it sounds like he´s puttin on his audience.}

_{Another point: Does anyone have informations about the progresses of Maxine Gordon´s book about her late husband ?}

[The day the high priest died]

I don´t remember exactly where I was, but it was a terrible blow. The next thing I remember was the album "Sphere", done by Charlie Rouse, Kenny Barron, Buster Williams and Ben Riley and in the liner note they wrote that it was recorded while Monk was at the hospital in coma and that they hoped that someday he might here it, and that they learned about his death after finishing that album.

[Greatest Blakey SAXOPHONE Album]

Well I love them all: Hank, Griff, Wayne etc. from the records.

And when I started to hear the Messengers live, it was Bobby Watson and David Schnitter. I loved that group (with Valery Ponomarev on tp). They where hot.

And if I remember well, the last edition I heard they had a young guy on tenor and his name was Javon Jackson, right ? He did some very good stuff.

[Complete Bud Powell Blue Note/Roost and Verve]

I'm also rather fond of the very last Verve session: Blues in the Closet with Ray Brown and Osie Johnson.

I love his ballad interpretations here: Above all the version of "I Should Care" played in another key than usual (D-flat). That´s one of the best versions of that tune, that I heard. And "I didn´t know what time it was".

Woodyn You and My Heart stood still are also solid, same about "Elogie" which is much better here than on the Victor LP.

Nobody mentions the second Roost session from 1953. That´s also nice Bud, a bit subdued, but still fine....

[Tommy Flanagan]

I saw him life only once, it was in the mid 80´s with George Mraz and Art Taylor. One of the best trio sets I ever heard.

[Which Blue Note CDs did you generally prefer before the SHM reissues?]

I don´t know what SHM reissues are, but I voted for TOCJ reissues. I purchased a lot of that.

[Extra-curricular Bird in less than 10 discs]

hi Big Beat Steve !

Thank you for diggin´into the two albums I mentioned.

Well Bird in Paris really doesn´t have the best sound quality, it´s worse than the Miles-Dameron stuff from the same festival, but sure something that Bird-freaks will like. Anyway, I welcome each live recording with Bird where you also hear a bit of the stuff that his sidemen are doing, like KD and Al Haig, and a rare and nice Tommy Potter solo, and Max of course.

About Bird in Sweden: I still have the Spotlite double LP, I like especially the first half, Rolf Ericson is really nice.

The long jam on Body and Soul IMHO is so-so, somehow I allways had the impression that the participants were not sure where to go, to keep it as a ballad or double timing.....well anyway those are really nice collectors items, but ......

if I could keep only two live recordings with Bird, it would be "One Night at Birdland" with Fats and Bud, and "Summit Meeting at Birdland" with Diz and Bud.....

[Extra-curricular Bird in less than 10 discs]

Bird in Sweden from 1950 would be nice.

Maybe also Bird in Paris 1949.

[***** Max Roach Corner *****]

A book about the life and music of Max Roach would be fine...