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There's lots of great stuff on eMusic.com - in the Fantasy catalog. One of my favorites was recorded at the Shrine Auditorium on the 50s (only one mike, though!) and features Joe May, Albertina Walker and the Caravans, the Pilgrim Travelers, Dorothy Love Coates & the Original Gospel Harmonettes, and *many* more. My fave cut is a long medley by Coates and her group - such powerful stuff, and so beautifully phrased/sung! Given the way Concord is "handling" all that back catalog, I'd recommend grabbing some discs before it's too late... the title is The Great 1955 Shrine Concert, and for some weird reason, it's listed under "various artists" only. (Not easy to find when searching on artists' names.)

There's a lot more gospel on YouTube - I found tons of good videos some months back by clicking on links to "related videos"... And yes, Inez Andrews was something else! Now if only someone would get some Dorothy Love Coates uploaded... (I can dream, can't I? ) Edit: African music fans might wat to do searches over there on "gospel" + [add name of country]. There's everything from Ghanian pop gospel to Ethiopian Orthodox sacred songs (I'm hooked on the latter!)

Okay, you've converted me, from now on I'm "banjo_on_my_knee" and live in Alabama. You must be from Skopje, then - homeboy! http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=n2UJp3vN-y0 Edit: I *love* their style! (Heard them live around the time the clip was originally broadcast.)

I've only used my real name online for publication. Aliases are kinda fun when you get to choose them yourself. Signed, Agent 99 [shoe phones, anyone?]

There are indeed, 7/4. (I'm not kidding.) As for all these confoundedly confusing usernames, just call me Agent 99 and we'll be fine. posing with own shoe phone!

Agreed completely, papsrus. In fact, the supposed "hostility" here is... a myth. It's a pretty friendly place. But, as papsrus said, you do have to be able to roll with the occasional threads on 50s TV game shows and the like.

pollock, I believe I do know who you are... because I read the post you're saying you made. I have to say, there wasn't any need to go there, especially given the fact that you've got the "ignore user" function available over there. (Here, too - you can even block private messages from specific users if you want to.) That said, welcome - I hope you can add some positive input here. Cheers, clave [aka various other usernames]

So would I! Believe it or not, I didn't know who she was until I read a novel a few years back where "Fujiyama Mama" comes into the plot...

fRoots is definitely quirky, but the quality of the writing (and features) is far, far higher than is the case with most mags that cover the same - or similar - territory. The editor is married to a woman from Madagascar (a singer from the group Tarika), so there's actually a ton of good info. about Malagasy music available on the fRoots site, including discographies with lots of rare recordings, etc. As for what Bev's said about the way things are approached, I have to agree, but a lot of their enthusiasms are contagious, and some highly knowledgeable people have been writing for them over the years. Definitely worth looking into! I haven't heard the ngoni quartet album as yet, but want to buy a copy. Sometimes - and only sometimes - non-African producers are tuned into recording/producing things that African musicians would *like* to release for the local market, but really can't, due to market demands. I think this album might be one of those. (Some of Toumani Diabate's recordings definitely fall into that category as well.) Info. on Justin Adams here.

I think everyone buys from used CD shops, artists very much included. They know that a certain percentage of discs are going to end up there, or at least, in my experience, most do. Here's a story (true) for you about throw-away music... A press person [works for a label that will remain nameless] told me about a trip they made to another city. During the trip, they had a dinner meeting with a couple of journalists. One offered to drive the press person back to their hotel, and the press person said "OK." While on the way there, the driver asked if the press person would mind taking a brief detour. The press person said no - and the driver promptly pulled into an alley. Of course, the press person wondered what was going on. The driver said "I want you to see something," and then pulled the trunk latch. Then both of them got out of the car and walked to the trunk - which was absolutely overflowing with promo CDs in Jiffy mailing bags. The driver had parked next to a dumpster, and for the next 20 minutes or so he proceeded to methodically rip open each package, scan the contents quickly - and then either toss the disc back in the trunk, or into the dumpster. The vast majority of the discs that had been in the trunk ended up in the dumpster. The press person was amazed, and yet - they also saw the sense in what this journalist was doing. - Having gotten promo copies of discs for a good number of years, I can say that this story rings *very* true to me.

That's a very nice LP - used to have a copy of my own. Tadd's work is (I think) unjustly neglected/overlooked.

Having grown up in the country, I can't remember a time when the selection of music on the radio *wasn't* limited! Cable TV/FM helped, but still... the selection was/is minuscule, compared to what you can find on both AM and FM in most major cities, and in many smaller ones, too. Going to Philadelphia or NYC (when I was younger) was fun for the record shopping alone! Jazz, classical (etc.) LPs couldn't easily be found in the better record shops where I lived, and you special-ordered what you wanted, or went to the city to buy it.

Back in the early-mid 1990s, The Washington Post used to publish an "Ask an Expert" column in its Sunday Magazine. One week, they asked an RIAA rep about the best record stores in the D.C. area. At the time, there were two outstanding independent, family-owned stores. One specialized in classical music, and had an incredibly deep selection of back catalog material, mainly from European specialist labels. The other store was/is more generalized, but had a similar investment in jazz and "world music." Without missing a beat, the RIAA rep said "The Tower Records store on Pennsylvania Avenue." She went on to talk about the deep catalog there. You can imagine, I think, how the people at the small shops felt. (And that was in the days when there were still quite a few independent retailers in the area.) So when the industry people complain about sales, well... I think they have themselves to blame. Edited to add: stories like this one tell it all. (About artists and estates of artists suing UMG for unpaid back royalties.)

thanks, Chris - your kind words are really appreciated!

This has never made any sense to me. And the majors are sitting on treasure troves of "niche" material that a lot of people would love to be able to hear. An acquaintance of mine spent some time in the EMI Brasil vaults a number of years back, and was just stunned by all the top-notch material that deserves release, but has been more or less allowed to decay on the shelf. (I don't mean to imply that the originals are disintegrating; more like they've been ignored and forgotten and/or are perceived to be of little worth.) When I mentioned a Brazilian music blog where several highly respected artists have contributed rips (from vinyl) of extremely rare, o.p. material - one of the reasons they did that was to allow people to be able to hear some of the great (even unique) material that the majors in Brazil are refusing to reissue. These artists felt (in at least one case) that specific albums were/are hugely important - but that the music and its creators have been unjustly neglected due to label concern re. not being able to make any profits from potential reissue of this material. The sheer unfairness (and shortsightedness) of companies holding back on issuing some of these albums has literally contributed to a skewed view of Brazilian musical and cultural history. so... maybe the people who sent these files to be posted were doing something that's technically illegal, but that pales in comparison to the way the record companies have selectively ignored these artists and their work. So where's the moral high ground there? i personally believe it's with the people who, by making the music available again, are actually lobbying for it to be reissued. (and I feel grateful to them for making it possible to listen to these recordings, after them being off the market for years and years...)

I'd like to add my own thanks to everyone for keeping the door open here. it's much appreciated!

wordsandsounds, it would be one thing if Mike had been above-board in his own conduct on this, but - all the personal slams against me (and others, like Onyabirri) have made it an untenable situation. I'm not meaning to muddy the waters - these problems aren't going to go away all by themselves. Talking things through is crucial - sadly, that's the exact opposite of what's been done. Things have been allowed to fester. I have addressed these things in my attempts at correspondence with Mike, but have received no replies, and don't expect to, this late in the game. Marc Meyers was the guiding light - in so many ways, the board at its best was a reflection of what he did, and what he and Mike R. chose to build there. perhaps the material at this link would help explain where I'm coming from - point #7 especially. Truthfully, I have doubts as to whether any of these issues will be resolved. It's a very sad situation, to my way of thinking.

"The other part" isn't being addressed, as far as I can tell.

Chris, although i won't join you in your characterization of any of the mods, the "virtual duct tape" thing is (I feel) off the charts. Of course, since the remark was made to me, then seconded by a mod, I'm not exactly without prejudice in the matter. But I do find that (and many other recent remarks) to be appallingly rude and (I kind of hate to use this word; it's so loaded) disrespectful of people who've been supportive of the board and site.

Aggie, thanks - though I've actually been talking about both legal and illegal downloads! So Bev's got the high ground here, but not me.

Remarks about "virtual duct tape" sure aren't helping much, though. I honestly believe that some recent actions and words would be understandable if all the participants were second graders who'd gotten into a playground brawl, but... that's not the case. I wish Marc Meyers were still alive, for all kinds of reasons, the board being a very small part of that... even so. And someone from that board brought the fight over here, to this thread, pretty recently. That was also uncalled-for.

Aggie, I have a lot of sympathy for your views, as I've wrestled with them myself, and am not at all 100% sure where I stand on the issue right now, except for this - I think intent is crucial. Like many people here, I resisted downloading for a long time, and then found that i could legally download rare and o.p. music from sources like eMusic.com I still didn't like the idea of low-bitrate files (and that hasn't changed), but the opportunity to be able to hear (and, sometimes, study) music that had been absolutely n/a in any form (inn the US, at least) lured me in. Would I like to have liner notes, even now? The answer is yes - but the tradeoff has been, for the most part, positive and painless. As Bev's mentioned re. labels like Chandos making back catalogue available, they stand to gain far more than they might lose in potential illegal file-sharing - customer loyalty is one of them, and that's a *huge* factor in itself. (One of the single most important, I think.) And on eMusic alone, you can now get an incredible amount of stuff that's been confined to "local" markets since forever. One of the areas that's surging ahead on that site: locally-produced music from all over Africa. In the jazz and classical categories, you can see much the same... and in others as well. CD Baby is now giving artists the option of selling both CDs and downloads (includes liners). A lot of artists are opting into that, and I've got more than a sneaking suspicion that they're gaining airplay as a result - along with exposure on music blogs, which is where "niche" music has had a home for quite some time. yes, a lot of people are greedy, a lot of people could care less about whether the artist gets any money or not, but I'm not sure that that's the case for the folks who really *care* about the music in question. I'm seeing - increasingly - artists sending copies of their CDs to MP3 bloggers, so that those bloggers can (if they choose) promote their stuff. I've also seen respected artists going the next step, in making copies of rare, o.p. material (that majors are sitting on and refusing to reissue) available via music blogs. In several cases this has resulted in reissues of the actual recordings, for people to actually buy. (The cases I'm citing have mostly been occurring on Brazilian-focused blogs, and the recordings in question have been reissued by Brazilian majors - small labels, too.) There are times when I feel that people go too far with this and take it into questionable territory, but for those who really love good music, that's seldom the case. I've been burned by pirates myself, through legit outlets - and it makes me angry that anyone would have the gall to steal everything (even the artwork and logos!) to rip off artists who don't even own the rights to the recordings in question. (It's happened to me - and at least one other person I know - in the course of buying rare Brazilian discs.) I would actually like to be able to give a couple of artists some kind of compensation for the losses they've incurred through what the pirates did. I have no sympathy at all for that kind of activity. but now we're dealing with new media, and trying to impose the same laws used for the "old" media (along with the older business models) is simply not working. What we've got on the books now, via the DMCA, is mostly unrealistic. That whole act - and all its provisions - needs to be gone over very carefully and amended so that artists benefit - and so that the default stance toward consumers isn't one that views them all as potential pirates (or worse). but I think I'd better get off my soapbox for now, eh?

Indeed, it's Friday. Let's think about it on monday morning. Sounds like a great idea to me!

I think something that's missing from this discussion (though I've raised it several times, as have others) is that *internet distribution is a reality now.* an awful lot of what the RIAA is trying to do is self-defeating because they're ignoring new business models that they should be using instead of scorning. Even Maria Schneider sells high-bitrate downloadable files on her portion of the ArtistShare site, along with PDFs of the liners to her CDs. The industry's infrastructure has been in the process of collapsing - and being reinvented via other means/media - for some years now. But they keep insisting that everyone has to play by their rules, even if the way in which they do business is entirely outmoded. People might not like the fact that things have changed, but there's no way to turn back the clock. if the majors act in a creative way, to get their stuff out there to the people who want it, then ... things will be different, and hopefully, better, for lots of people. Individual artists (and not just artists under 30!) have been moving to new, internet-based models for sales and the majors are apparently loath to follow. That's undercutting their profits, in a pretty substantial way - as are the growing number of artists and labels that are opting out of RIAA membership. Oh well. We won't solve the world's problems today, will we?!

Aggies, how can this be dealt with in a reasonable way, other than charging people twice for the same new item? (Again, I'm not being facetious or intending to be provocative in any way at all.) What if the thing you ripped is o.p. and rare anyway? What if the label's out of business, and hasn't had its catalogue bought up by another label? There are so many "what ifs" that I'm not sure it's possible to make some sort of boilerplate ruling - except in our private lives.