Big Beat Steve

He's no slouch either on his first BN album "Let Me Tell You 'Bout It", and his "Billy In The Lion's Den" with Bill Jennings on King as well as all of his earlier 78 rpm leader outings for Savoy, Chess, Gotham, etc. are all worthwhile He is one of those whose recordings I've always bought unseen-unheard; as I love both bebop AND R&B of the 40s/50s his presence is good reason enough for me any time.

What I meant to say is that a CORNET (not corOnet which just might be something else, I didn't check) is a sort of slightly shorter trumpet (as played by very early jazz musicians) whereas a fluegelhorn definitely is larger than a trumpet so a fluegelhorn cannot be a cornet. But that's a side note only.

The track listing reads like something thrown together from Shorty's features with the Woody Herman and Stan Kenton bands (hence the 40s starting date) and his own Giants recordings for RCA and Capitol plus a few obscurities such as two tracks from that Boots Brown & His Blockbusters LP for Groove. I'd say in today's world and with so many collectors apparently saving every penny for their core interests and therefore exploring "side interests" by buying budget P.D. compilations only, this would be an OK starter for Shorty Rogers newbies but if you want to have a more comprehensive Rogers collection you'd end up duplicating everything everywhere else. The overall compilation reeks of a typical case of another compiler taking advantage of material that is in the "Public Domain" now by European valid standards. Nothing basically wrong with that (a law is a law) but this "normally" would make the "usual (U.S.) suspects" cry out loud about ripping off artists (well, mostly labels, ain't it?) if this had come from the "Andorran thieves". So how about it, fellas, want to have another go at THIS label? :D BTW, I am also glad to see Sandi (Eula) posting here. Her posts over at AAJ are always fascinating reading stuff. But say, a fluegelhorn certainly is no cornet??

Ha, I saw the light and grabbed this one a goodly 10 years ago (2nd hand but NM) for the very same reason you name: It's one of those compilations that go where others (less enlightened compilers) fear to tread. :D Need to pull it out again and give it a listen. Thanks for making this music available, Chris! It's actually this kind of V.A. compilations that I like to snap up. They either cover ground others tend to overlook (and thus fill gaps) or they make material available that would never make it onto single artist discs. How else would you reissue some obscure but fine artist who left only one single 4-track session from the 78rpm era behind? And sometimes V.A. compilations from other albums can serve as a great introduction indeed. During my money spending sprees at Mole Jazz in the 90s I came across a copy of the mid-50s Liberty LJH6001 "Jazz In Hollywood" sampler which at that time held lots of new music to me. This made me explore the Liberty "Jazz In Hollywood" single artist series (either through originals on eBay or Fresh Sound reissues) so I now have most of them, and this naturally led to exploring the entire NOCTURNE catalog. All because of one sampler. Re- that JAZZTONE sampler, I figured the one shown under the eBay link above was the one Larry Kart mentioned earlier. This Jazztone sampler still is all over the place (I have three different pressings of it, each with different artwork) - it must have sold (or was given away as an introductory offer, as evident from contemporary mag ads) to lots of record club members who otherwise would not have touched jazz with a 10-foot pole so it still crops up at garage sales. ) Yet no Pee Wee Russell playing "Stuyvesant Blues" on that, in fact that track was on Jazztone J-1009 (sez Bruyninckx) but on NO other Jazztone sampler, and "Congo Blues" seems to have been on Jazztone J-1204 only, so go figure ...

Is that "Google Eyes" vocalist listed for the Feb. 6, 1950 session above actually JOSEPH AUGUST aka "Mr Google Eyes", I wonder? Bruyninckx and Jepsen don't list him, nor does the French RCA Black&White 3-LP series that has all the RCA master takes.

Ha, no! (And yes!) No - I am neither a displaced American nor a "Haze follower". Like I said, I find him quite amusing to listen to here and there (you might consider his records just "good-time late night party music") and have a few tracks of his on various rockabilly compilation LP's but never rated him highly enough among my record buying priorities to buy any of his own records EVER! My real music listening and record collecting priorities are elsewhere (as obvious from my other occasional posts around here ). But yes - he does have a following among rockabilly fans in the entire 50s subculture throughout Europe, including Germany (or rather did - in the late 80s and 90s, don't know about very recent trends in this subculture, some things change even there) and he even received coverage in rock'n'roll (the REAL 50s thing - not what you Yanks call rock'n'ROLL :D) and rockabilly mags in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. I know quite a few around here who consider him a "cult" figure and to them spinning the occasional Hasil Adkins record at record hops is a must!

Fun listening and bopping to him as part of the rockabilly record diet if taken in moderate and limited doses, but in the long run his yelling, ranting and pre-punk anti-musicianship can get on your nerve. "She Said" with all its shrieking is fun, though, especially when played late at night at a record hop and all the rockabilly juiceheads finally knock themselves out to the music. :D

Of course, but the other way it would still be faster and more convenient (no need to start off by comparing aurally - do we know for sure what emusic does with track sequences?). And the info is available out there after all. Anyway ... now the Cap'n knows ...

Bit confusing, the info given above. Title listings would have helped, as you never know for sure if the sequence is the same on all reissue sources. Bruyninckx sez thus (abbreviated track listings as reviewers would do): Gooch - Whippet - Bernie's - April: 29-01-55 Morgan, Candoli, Wild Bill Davis, Robert Rodriguez (b), José Mangual (bgo), Rafael Miranda (conga), Ubaldo Nieto (timb) Remainder of original LP tracks: 31-03-55 Candoli, Morgan, Gray, Perkins, Roberts, Vinnegar, Marable Remainder (tracks 11-15) not included on the original LP would be the live recordings from the Crescendo club (date as given by Kyo) first relased later on in Japan.

Pleeeeze, just let your imagination run free. Carole Reiff's book is a photo book too, so what the pic "says" is what can be gathered from a rather funny view of this character taken from the REAR. Where are all those who own this book here anyway? Where is everybody? I realize lots of hardcore jazz fans would rather drop dead than buy a book where it says plainly on the cover it's all about "Rock'n'Roll" but there just GOT to be plenty of forumists who at least own Carole Reiff's book (it's a classic).

Sorry, the book is right in front of me but I don't have a scanner (nor a digital camera - I still use my old Rollei) and besides, it's a huge coffee-table book and the pic is a 2-page spread (with Pee Wee fairly close to the spine, i.e. in the center of the pic). But maybe somebody else out these has that book too. It was reprinted later in a smaller- sized edition. BTW, if you want to see the other side of wee little Pee Wee , have a look at page 70 of Carole Reiff's "Nights In Birdland" (Simon & Schuster, London 1987), a book that I guess quite a few forumists own.

A large (2-page), striking pic of Pee Wee the Midget standing between Count Basie and Jimmy Rushing (or rather being lifted up by them) is in "The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock'n'Roll" (Jim Miller, ed., Rolling Stone Presse, Random House, 1976). He sure looks tiny next to Jimmy Rushing (but who wouldn't?). Hard to say if "he" was a "she", though.

Indeed, though Roy Hogsed predated Haggard, Owens and Bakersfield by more than just a few years (and stylistically too). Merle Travis would be a much more contemporary major name who made the trek west at the time Roy Hogsed appeared there. @MG: Very well put, especially the Bop/R&B "crossover" evolution. Many jazz fans don't realize this to this day and still draw a strict dividing line between jazz and R&B, and yet at the time the boundaries were nowhere near as sharp as latter-day jazz fans mainly concerned with (jazz) art for art's sake made them to look. Leo Parker and Gene Ammons are just 2 examples of this crossover type of jazz. (MG, I am a bit surprised, though, that your preferred jazz era has sort of moved backwards in time from your focus on Soul Jazz. Anyway, welcome to the club! )

c. 1935 to c. 1955 as the core era (swing, bop, cool), with a representative selection of "classic jazz" and hard bop thrown in as well. I agree that the 2nd half of the 30s and the 40s (up to early 50s) were incredibly fertile, and the documented transition from swing to bop (and R&B) is always fascinating, down to the most obscure surviving recordings.

Russ Freeman? Frank Patchen? Just a guess...

Will keep an eye open for this for you but can't promise anything. As it happens, I am more or less in the same situation. A long time ago I bought Vol. 2 and 3 of this set as separate LP's on Blue Star (I suppose this is the issue label you are loking for as well). Now some will say "There cannot be a Vol. 2 as the French Blue Star issue of the early 80s was a 2-LP set of Vol. 1 and 2 and then a single LP of Vol. 3". Well, mine are SPANISH pressings. They did 3 single LP's in Spain. Same cover artwork but liner notes in Spanish. So I am in sort of a fix in finding the missing Vol. 1 (the only copy of the French 2-LP set of Vol. 1 and 2 seen in recent times was priced outrageously for such a reissue, especially considering I already had half of the music) but will keep searching. I know there are CD's around but apart from the fact I still prefer vinyl I hate accumulating duplicates unnecessarily.

BTW, the WIllie Jones article posted in the starting post is available in a much more readable (better layouted) version here: http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~campber/wiljo.html

I happen to have that CD (and quite a few others from that series) and it's nice listening, and the fact that jazz was prohibited in WARTIME Central Europe (wherever the axis powers were present) is obvious but apparently (luckily) never went to the extremes of a 100% "blackout" in any of the countries affected. So within the scope of what was possible style-wise and swing-wise in Europe (please consider that even in peacetime only a fairly small share of the music recorded in the USA was ever exported to Europe in the 30s to serve as an inspiration to aspiring local jazz musicians) it still was quite decent music and showed some keen awareness of what was happening in jazz. All I meant to say is that not even in Italy there was a total lack of jazz during the Mussolini era (which your wording might have implied to those not familiar with at least a few basic facts). But that's a side note only anway - so back to the main topic of those $$$$$$ earners to sellers who manage to sell originals of the discs of the B-V band (and others of their ilk) to the insatiable Asians. :D

Oh yeah? The RIVIERA JAZZ reissue label seems to think differently and seems to have plenty of documentary evidence to prove it. Google it up some time.

Great band, great record, MG! Well chosen and well written, your endorsement of a band that exemplified the grassroots R&B of the times ! BTW, the label can't have been that "pirate-ish". Line note author Dave Penny ain't no nobody. So Official apparently operated in that grey area of a "couldn't-care-less" reissue policy of the majors where these doings were tolerated, otherwise the label would not have been marketed THAT openly everywhere. But that's beside the point by now anyway, really.

I second the vote for the Byrd/Gryce Jazz Lab albums. And then there is his album on Signal (later Savoy) as well as "When Famer met Gryce". A particular favorite of mine (though slighted by some) is his work with Clifford Brown on those 1953 Paris sessions. Gryce always had a knack of coming up with very ear-catching arrangements.

There's one oddity in your listing: "Shelly Manne & His Men Vol. 2" (Contemporary C-2511) (New Works must be some sort of reissue tag) was actually released before "The West Coast Sound". "West Coast Sound" (C-3507) was a 12in reissue of the 10in disc C-2503 called just "Shelly Manne & His Men" but was augmented by 4 tracks from 1955. So C-2503 really ought to be considered Vol. 1. If you want to, you might consider "West Coast Sound" (on which those 4 tracks from 1955 were new) to be Vol. 3. This would fit in with the sequence because it predated Vol. 4 (Swinging Sounds, C-3516). "The Three and The Two" (the 12in reissue of 2 10in LP's) wasn't issued in this form until 1960 and the musicians on the recording dates that made up these two original 10in records (Russ Freeman on "The Two" and Jimmy Giuffre and Shorty Rogers on "The Three") are no "Men" lineup so they do not really fit in the "Men" group's discography.

Well, this discog would have been a bit brief for THE LION, wouldn't it?

Indeed ... This session is listed in the discography accessible under www.visarkiv.se (under Lars Färnlöf's name) but as it apparently was not released on record until a LONG time after the recording at the time Nicolausson compiled his discography it had not yet seen the light of day so was not listed. But though Swedish jazz is one of my particular collecting interests it is rather the jazz from earlier deaces (pre-mid-60s) so I am no expert on later developments at all - sorry ... But where are all the Swedes around here? Nobody among them interested extensively in the jazz from their own country?

Addendum: Björn Netz must have made an impression in his own country early on. In ORKESTER JOURNALEN’s annual Scandinavian jazz poll he finished third in the Tenor sax ranking in both 1962 and 1963, in both cases behind Bernt Rosengren and Bjarne Nerem but ahead of more established and basically more renowned names such as Carl-Henrik Norin, Erik Nordström, Hacke Björksten, Mikkel Flagstad, etc., Quite an achievement at this relatively early stage of his career, considering by that time his only recorded evidence had been two EP’s with Staffan Abeléens group.