Big Beat Steve

I listened to my LP of Vol. 3 of the "All Night Sessions" this morning again and did not hear any sonic anomalies like you describe them. FWIW, if you fancy listening in to a faint radio station "behind" the music, I'd suggest Country Routes RFD 9004 (Bob Wills - Harmony Park Airshots January 1953).

I remember watching the entire series of videos (they were aired on one of our TV channels and I taped them to VHS) and I was truly impressed by the historic footage. And this is one of the reasons I've kept them and why I'd like to watch them again (but am not sure I'd want to find out how the VHS cassettes have stood the test of time and whether my VHS player might foul up so somehow keep postponing it ). But the interviews and narrations? I dunno ... And the skewedness of how and why (as if ...) the entire history of jazz could be hinged on Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington ... Oh well ... (The same goes for the accompanying book IMO, BTW, although on a different level it is an interesting and rewarding one, though to be taken with a grain of salt when it comes to how balanced the presentation of the history really is.) Overall it really looks like one of those cases of someone succeeding in the media world by placing himself in the center of attention of "key players" and multiplicators in the business, regardless of how substantial and well-founded the KNOWLEDGE he has to offer really is. But isn't that what the media business has been all about for along time? Making waves and slinging easily digestible buzzwords is what counts above all. Something substantial? Not so much .... As in most specialist areas (particularly when history and knowledge of same comes into play) there are plenty out there who are way more knowledgeable but they are not the ones who have endeared themselves with and therefore are called upon by the deciders.

Ha ... 2 out of 3 of your post will be lined up here too for Christmas Eve. They are what you might call "common ground" palatable to my better half and our son. Will also spin "Kenton's Christmas" to myself during the day, though.

Re- Bob Weinstock, the founder of Prestige: Digging right now into the "Gerry Mulligan Quartet" volume from the Oxford Studies in Recorded Jazz" mentioned recently by Joe Bip in the "Reading Now ..." thread, and the below paragraph (in the context of the Gerry Mulligan recording debut at Prestige in 1951) had me smiling: Given the stylistic catalog of Prestige from (almost) Day One, it should be be interesting to see if and how these personal preferences of Bob Weinstock - as part of his personality - are evoked in this forthcoming book and to learn how Weinstock really got into (or got to grips with) "bebop and beyond" from his personal point of departure. BTW, Vol. 1 (1949-.53) from the earlier "Listening To Prestige" series arrived today too, and what I can say right away is that these books should be entertaining reading that will certainly open up new perspectives for most readers. But do NOT expect the discussions of the sessions to be reviews in the usual sense of the word but rather very personal listening impressions for everyone to stack up against his own experiences to get an interesting look at a different angle. This should open up some new listening perspectives. After randomly flipping open a few pages, I am in fact wondering about some of the author's angles and perspectives. Re- the 26 January 1950 session by Sonny Stitt and Bud Powell (Strike Up The Band/I Want To Be Happy/Taking A Chance On Love/Fine And Dany), the author says: "These are songs I wouldn't have thought of as jazz standards, especially "Strike up The Band" and "I Want To Be Happy". Hmm ... Sonny Stitt may have been a sort of trailblazer for adopting these songs into the bebop vocabulary, but Rust's Discography (that runs up to 1942) has 3 issued recordings listed (by Red Nichols plus assorted semi-jazz dance bands) for "Strike Up The Band", as well as about 8 entries for "I Want To Be Happy". (I did not check the other two tunes) So ...? At any rate all four have been established jazz standards across the stylistic board for many decades. Re- the 27 February 1950 session by Al Haig (Liza /Strs Fell On Alabama/Stairway To The Stars/Opus Caprice), the text says: "I was only able to find 'Liza'. So plenty of leisure to give it several listens (...) And me ... listening to 'Liza' one more time, and wishing I had the rest of this session." Huh??? The entire session was reissued on the double album "First Sessions 1949/50" in 1979 (P-24081, a compilation that does look like mandatory listening for anyone covering this period of Prestige in detail, doesn't it?). I did not check for other reissues of that session as I had bought this set (a U.S. pressing) locally not very long after it came out and have often spun it through the years. Another copy of this twofer (UK pressing this time) has been gracing the "second copies" corner of my record shelves for years, so copies are around out there (Discogs has more than 50 listed ). This blind spot really is rather difficult to understand, particularly if you are all out to do an in-depth session-by-session survey of that period. Anyway ... I'm really looking forward to browsing this book and hopping from session to session while listening to the respective music during the holidays. And Merry Christmas to everyone!

I never noticed anything like this on my LPs (which are original UK pressings on Vogue-Contemporary). Guess I'll listen to them again during the holidays.

Looks like some Egyptian goddess statue posing as a silent listener.

Mike, I read your post several times but cannot quite figure out what the puzzlement could possibly be. When I wrote my post I had both LPs before me and checked the entries in the Bruyninckx (digital) discography. The key facts I listed do match what you wrote. So we should have got this settled? (Except that in my post I had rashly and incorrectly written March 1955 for the Freddie Redd session - in fact it was "not quite March yet" - it was 28 February 1955 But that's unrelated to Hampton Hawes whom we are concerned with here.)

To clear this up and to add to what Mike said, there is a similarity in titles but NOT in contents: The "East/West Controversy" LP on Xanadu 104 was a "split session" (one side per leader) of the Hampton Hawes session for Vantage (of September, 1951) combined with a 1957 session by Paul Chambers (originally released under the leader name of Mel Lewis on VeeJay). The "Piano:East/West" LP on Prestige 7067 has one half by Hampton Hawes (recorded in December, 1952, originally released on 10" LP Prestige 212) and the other side by Freddie Redd (recorded in March, 1955).

Yes, that's how I found them and ordered Vol. 1.

Those heat variations are obvious (even inside the glove compartment). Which I understand would mean that this would or could accelerate deterioration? Particularly since my car is parked outside year in, year out. Not the case here, amazingly, though. BTW, my "real" CDs (that are fodder for my car player) haven't deteriorated either. But I would not have been surprised if the already existing degradation on that CD-R had continued inside the car.

Getting back to the problem of MUSIC CDs that have become (almost) unplayable due to background noise and distortion: If I had to figure out an IMAGE of what I guess the damage to the sonic reprodcution of those "unplayable" CDs is like it would be close to the image above. Like I said earlier, the distortion is hard to describe, it is a more or less crunching distortion that does seem to be linked to the actual music. I.e. the distortion patterns follow those of the music (that you still can hear, but in a bad way). And the strange thing is that while I do have the distinct impression that the dud CD-Rs from that recent haul I made were corrupted by problems with the glued-on label that had become detached partially and caused imbalance, the distorted noise that overlays the music sounds very much like that on CD-Rs I burnt (or had received) many years ago and assumed they had failed due to age. But these CDs never had any glued-on labels that may have become detached and cause imbalance. Just to check I went outside to my car and retrieved one of these "failing" CD-Rs. I had burnt it a good 20 years ago, found it had started to show increasing distortion (on the last few tracks) about 10 years ago, bought a new "real" CD of it for my collection and relegated the CD-R (that I'd figured was on its way out) to a corner in my car glove box so I'd be able to listen to what remained listenable on it (it's goodtime music that you can enjoy while driving for as long as the sound is OK). I had not listened to it in years, though, but spun it again now and to my amazement found that the distortion still is as it was back then: degradation starts at track 23 out of 27, increases and tracks 26 and 27 are virtually unlistenable. But no further deterioration during those pas 10 years! Odd ... But what I think I've learnt from the above discussion here is that those dud CD-Rs that arbitrarily jump, splutter and skip and then resume and/or stop altogether and on next try might not start up again at all (at least not on every CD player) are likely to be afflicted by a different kind of deterioration of the data. Isn't it?

I've owned Xanadu 104 ("The East-West Controversy" that features this Vantage session) for a long, long time and like it a lot.

This one is in the pile (crate, rather ) of my "yet-to-be-listened-to" recently purchased vinyls. I'd been hipped to Hampton Hawes in the 90s after I read Ted Gioia's "West Coast Jazz" book where Hampton Hawes is given glowing reviews. The Vols. 1 to 3 and the three All Night Sessions were my first purchases and I have by now accumulated about a dozen LPs covering his 50s output as well as "Here and Now" from the 60s - and the "Bird Song" CD of previously unreleased 1956/58 recordings for Contemporary. Hampton Hawes is one of those artists where I so far have always felt I can never go wrong with my purchases.

Thanks for your suggestions. This is more or less what I was afraid the turnout would be. Though I really cannot see how the disc that plays with that significant distortions can be ripped or copied to give better results on the disc the files are copied to. In fact I had already tried to copy one of the affected CD-Rs via my CD burner but the burner refused to continue after the first reading step. The sound distortion is hard to describe but is just what it was on the occasional CD-R that had failed in the past (after a couple of years). Except that on those older CD-Rs the sound got worse towards the final tracks (indicating that data had started to fail from the outer edge towards the center) . Whereas with the CD-Rs I recently got and turned out to be bad, the sound improved towards the final tracks (without getting perfect), which to me seems to indicate that the center area where the label clearly had started to peel was affected more because the CD rotates faster when the laser reads the music data in that zone and slower as it advances towards the outer edge. On one CD-R (that I found a bit more important to salvage, though it is no desert island CD either ) I tried to remove the label manually but it was only the already detached section that came off (both round the center hole and near the edges). But that neither improved nor worsened the playback sound. So I guess I'll at least try to make "next-generation" CD-R copies of those that are still intact. In preparation of other CD-Rs that might come my way from that source and that might be historically more important to safeguard for the future. (Different story ... )

Well, I'm talking about full-size LABELS on CDs (i.e. CD-Rs). I.e. almost the same diameter as the CD itself. Price stickers (or similar) are a totally different category, and I'd guess cardboard LP sleeves (that the sticker is attached to) are MUCH less sensitive to mistreatment (with potentially dire results) than CD-R discs.

Any hints on how to remove label stickers without impairing the "rest" of the CD-R? (A question because of my problems described in my earlier post about labels that have come detached along the outer and inner circumference(s) - but not nearly enough to allow them to be peeled off yet apparently enough to upset playability of the CDs) Not that I have high hopes because the data layer may have become damaged anyway, but a try is a try ...

What (vinyl) did I buy today? Something that probably had the clerks at my favorite local birck-and-mortar store wondering once again about my eclectic tastes: - Champion Jack Dupree (1940-1950 recordings) on Wolf BoB-14 (one of those collector's labels that went out of its way not to duplicate other current or available reissues by the same artist) - Sauter-Finegan - The Return of the Doodletown Fifers (U.S. original on United Artists - "Ultra Audio" in "wall to wall stereo" ) Each was 5 EUR. Not bad.

Thanks, looks interesting enough to me and I'll be looking forward to this one too. As hinted at in an earlier post, it will certainly be interesting to compare the presentation of label histories in this one and in the forthcoming Pacific Jazz book by James Harrod.

Suits me fine, then ... I had noticed what you say from the sample pages on Amazon for Vol. 1 (49-53) but the "essay" character was not so clear for the to-be-released book.

Ouch ... I in turn wasn't aware of these 4 previous books. So now you are forcing me to consider an order , pushing my music bookshelves closer to getting overcrowded AGAIN, though I've only quite recently expanded them to free additional space. Seriously ... So that new book is a "summary" or "Best of" of these 4 earlier ones? (Hope not ... hoping it DOES offer extra info and insights even for the period coverd in these 4 earlier books) At any rate I've just placed an order for Vol. 1 (1949-53) of which I think I have most of those on my LP shelves that have ever been reissued. (And besides, it's an era that usually has been overlooked elsewhere.) Depending how I like this one (and the new book to be published in January) I'll decide about the other volumes.

Just for the record, and in connection with the apearance of TRLP-18 in the Tom Lord discography, this album has earlier been listed in Jepsen's Jazz Records Vol. 5 (published in 1963) and in the discography by Walter Bruyninckx, both in the printed edition published in the 80s and in the somewhat more recent (and updated) digital version. The entries look like any normally released album. Jepsen and the printed edition of Bruyninckx forgot "Budo" in the track listing but this was corrected in the digital version of the Bruyninckx discography. It is likely that THIS is where Lord picked up his info. So it really seems like this album was "reputed" to exist for decades and decades and for a long time nobody ever made an effort to really check and set the record straight.

Basically I've also found that some brands of CD-R blanks last almost forever, some don't. Only problem ... you only find out afterwards (after years) which ones will last long and longer ... I still have quite a few CD-Rs burnt by (or for) me in the second half of the 90s that still play OK. Whereas others have failed after some 10 years. But to add another aspect to this discussion of CD-Rs becoming unplayable: As part of my haul from the estate of a deceased collector (metioned elsewhere - e.g in the jaz book thread) I recently took home a huge bunch of (real) CDs but also about 150 CD-Rs burnt for this chap by a fellow collector in (I guess) the years between 2005 and 2010, and very professionally done, including the inlays and printed labels. (At first sight they look like one of these cheapo PD label CDs.) BUT ... the labels on the earlier CD-Rs have started to peel off and are impossible to press back on - and just as impossible to remove. And it is these CD-Rs (about the initial 50 or so) of which many make nastily distorted noises when playing, as if the data are beginning to deteriorate (and some skip and jump to and fro or stop all of a sudden). But it seems the detached labels are the culprits. Don't know if it is the out-of-balance of the detached labels or the label glue penetrating into the data layer but the damage seems to be caused there. Because those where the labels are becoming detached round the edges fail most often. Whereas those among the later ones (when he seemed to have changed to a diffferent, glossier self-printed label that adheres perfectly well) that I've listened to so far do play perfectly well. At any rate, I'm seeing myself burning backup CD-Rs of the bunch before long.

Paperback ordered! Looking forward to receiving it in January, and regretting that the preordered Pacific Jazz book by James Harrod will take some more time to arrive. It certainly wil be interesting to compare how these two major labels are covered. And I'll take the word of Allen Lowe (see below) that the Prestige book does not limit itself to the "usual suspects" of the biggest names only in covering the output of Prestige. At any rate, I'll have my copies of the Prestige discography by Michel Ruppli and of "The Prestige Book" (from the Japanese "Jazz Critique" series) within reach when digging into this new one. "When it comes to jazz, this is one of the rare books that we actually need, that does not cover the usual ground with the usual suspects. Prestige Records, for all the attention it has received from audiences, is not well known in the historical sense. Every jazz fan has these records, which is important, but few know the inside story, the complex process of the jazz independent label in the era before independent labels became as common as recording projects. And Tad Richards is the writer to do this, with a firm grasp of jazz's historical succession, the bebop era, and the musical needs of musician and audience. Read this book." — Allen Lowe,

Well, I for one would be interested in reading this - no doubt!

Now Doggett's recollections sound like some conclusive evidence, I'd say. But of course it's not as picturesque as a "chance recording" (the last one tossed off) becoming a million seller. As for Mike's statement about "no guarantee that the order of the matrix numbers represents recordings order" (no doubt that's true, though I'd guess there ARE cases where the matrix number order does represent the recording order, but how do we know?): Doesn't this upset and invalidate the much-loved practice of many collectors (often mentioned here too) to burn their own CDs with the contents of the orignal LPs reorganized in "session recording order"? Because that "session recording order" would then follow the order of numerically ascending matrix numbers (unless proof to the contrary indicating a different recording order exists). But as we have seen there is no guarantee that this order is "correct"?