Mark Stryker

I don't believe that Count Basie's "I Told You So" (1976) has been mentioned. The big draw here is that the charts were all written by Bill Holman; It's the best Basie big band album from the 70s or 80s that I've heard -- though, caveat emptor, I haven't head them all. http://www.amazon.com/Told-You-Count-Basie...4835&sr=1-1

It's from 1962 -- settings of the songs from the Charles Strouse-Lee Adams musical of the time that is best known for the songs "Once Upon A Time" and "I've Just Seen Her." I now see upon consulting Walter van de Leur's "Something To Live For: The Music of Billy Strayhorn" that eight of the album's ten arrangements were Strayhorn's: "Back To School," "I've Just Seen Her," "Which Way?", "If I Were You," "Once Upon a Time," "Our Children," "I Couldn't Have Done It Alone," and "We Speak the Same Language." I think I came to the album thanks to an enthusiastic contemporary review of it by LeRoi Jones that appeared in the literary magazine Kulchur (which also published some of John Litweiler's early work). Thanks for this -- I've read the Van de Leur book but didn't recall the discussion of these arrangements. Unfortunately, I didn't turn up a copy yesterday -- though I did stumble across a copy of Art Blakey's "Golden Boy," which I didn't buy since I already own, but I did mention in another post on that topic over in Jazz In Print. But I digress. Also, on the All Star Road Band album if anyone is still confused, the two-LP set under discussion came out in the early '80s and was just labeled "All Star Road Band" but didn't included the designation of Vol. 1; the cover was red. When a second set came out shortly thereafter, it was called "All Star Road Band, Vol 2." It was yellow. From the photos posted, it appears that "Vol. 1" was added to some CD versions. Regardless, the set list is the one that opens with two versions of "A Train" followed by "Such Sweet Thunder."

For anyone in the metro Detroit area interested in this album -- and it's a great one! -- I saw a copy yesterday at Encore Records in Ann Arbor in excellent shape for $18.87.

One of the things I like most about this site is that I get reminded of things I had once known but had forgotten and I learn things I never knew. Based on Chuck's list, I've been re-checking out "All Star Road Band," which I haven't listened to in probably 20 years. I get it -- great spirit, a more populist repertoire (dance setting) compared to the concert recordings, but still a nice cross section of music and the lack of formality pays big dividends in the inspiration of the playing. We talk a lot here about the way the music once functioned within the community and this is a great example of timeless art growing out yet another one-nighter for the people in a 40-year string of them. And, Lord, what incredible vibrations and timbre that saxophone section could create ("Bassment!"). Now, pace Larry, "All American in Jazz" is actually completely new to me. I'll look for it today -- we are blessed in metro Detroit with several kick-ass used stores -- but in the meantime, anyone want to enlighten me about this one?

Nos. 1 and 2 are actually very easy for me, but No. 3 is ridiculously difficult and changes every time I think about it. 1. The Far East Suite 2. The Great Paris Concert 3. Anatomy of a Murder/Afro Bossa/And His Mother Called Him Bill

Leaving aside the inanity of some of the nominees and categories, I can at least recommend these specific albums that are mentioned as records that I liked a lot this year. Opinions may vary. Jeff Watts, "Watts" Dark Key) John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, "Eternal Interlude" (Sunnyside) Clayton Brothers, "Brother to Brother" (Artist Share) John Patitucci Trio, "Remembrance" (Concord) Miguel Zenón, "Esta Plena" (Marsalis Music) Kurt Elling, "Dedicated To You: Kurt Elling Sings The Music Of Coltrane And Hartman." (Concord)

Yes, this is what I was trying to gauge, thanks. If anyone else has an opinion, please jump in.

I'm not sure I was clear enough with my second question: I'm trying to get a handle on whether these records were generally available (or not) prior to their reissue this year. Clearly, they're all available now. I'm trying to judge their value at least partially on whether they were previously out of print or unavailable for, say, 2 years, 5, years, 10 years, whatever. The notion is: The harder they were to acquire before this year, the more valuable their reissue becomes (leaving aside, of course, their relative merit artistically).

Hey gang, couple questons: 1. Anyone know if the "One Step Beyond" disc was eventually replaced? 2. I'm trying to process a lot of information for some year-end best-of lists and I'd like to hear opinions on the relative pre-2009 availibility of the following Blue Note reissues in any other reasonable editions. I haven't followed the comings and goings of these things as closely as many of you, and in judging the relative merit of these reissues it would be helpful to know if any have been especially hard to come by in recent years. Here are the ones I'm curious about: One Step Beyond Some Other Stuff Spring Green Street Bluesnik Thanks in advance for your obsessiveness.

Well, like a lot of great players around the country in the cracks, he's really been under-recorded. Off the top, I'd suggest projects led by Chicago drummer Damon Short. A surely out of date discography appears to be here: http://damonshort.home.comcast.net/~damonshort/shultz.htm And just to be clear, my reference to the complete command of modern harmony was not to oversell a musician who doesn't need any padding but to emphasize that Ryan is a fluent post-bopper (chromatic and modal harmony) and not tied to diatonic bebop like a Cy Touff.

Just a quick plug for an old friend: Ryan Shultz (note the correct spelling has no 'c') is an absolute monster musician: strong chops, complete command of modern harmony, loose phrasing that's more saxophone derived than anything else and really fresh post-bop ideas.

Thanks to all for filling in various details. Now that I've had a chance to check a few things at home, I see that the chronology at the end of Porter's Coltrane biography, citing Thomas, also dates this concert to February 1966. So does Wein when he recounts the story with a few more details and more or less the same quotes in his recent memoir, "Myself Among Others" (page 263). It seems clear, however, that pace Kelley, the clips I found in the Free Press library and the date on Sinclair's photo, this concert actually happened in January 1967. Good God, what I wouldn't give to hear what that sounded like.

http://www.backstagegallery.com/photodetai...S-4105-016.html Here's an evocative photo of Trane sitting in with Monk's quartet taken by Leni Sinclair in January 1967 at Cobo Hall in Detroit, just a few blocks from where I'm sitting at my desk at the Detroit Free Press. Does anyone know if audio from this performance exists? I don't recall a mention of this episode in Lewis Porter's Coltrane biograophy, but I don't have the book handy. This appears to be a George Wein produced concert on Jan. 22, which according to a clip I dug up in our library, included the following bill: John Coltrane Quintet, Modern Jazz Quartet, Clark Terry and J.J. Johnson. The Coltrane obituary that the Free Press ran in July says that this concert was his last appearance in Detroit and that it drew "5,000 people who stayed past midnight to hear his music." Our Coltrane clip file, by the way, also includes an "After Dark" column by one Ken Barnard from April 1963 that includes a brief interview apparently conducted that week during a gig at the Minor Key. Here are some excerpts and quotes: Barnard writes: When he and his quartet opened their current engagement the Minor Key Tuesday night, Trane had a patient struggle with a new mouthpiece. "It had some kinks in it," Trane said, "and you're not going to be happy unless you get just the right sound. I had to be the master of that that thing and so we had a battle. I said to it, 'We'll just see now,' but it won!" (about his early days): "I accepted work with all kinds of groups -- even if I didn't agree with their musical tenets, because I could learn something while I made a living." "What I hear now is a movement to freer forms of expression. There's a challenge in this. But I never feel jazz is going in any one direction; it's going in all directions. Jazz is tied up with emotion, and there are all kinds of emotion to be expressed."

Looks like the John McNeil-Bill McHenry Quartet is at Cornelia Street Cafe and appears to be recording live this weekend. That's a great little band -- McNeil is an original thinker, trumpet player and composer, short on flash but long on substance. Plus, he's got a lethal wit. I once saw a gig where he spied a Real Book sitting on the piano and said, "Hey, there's a Real Book. Now we can play a whole bunch of wrong changes!" Then he and the pianist played a chorus of something using one of the more egregious lead sheets -- my memory is hazy of that night (don't ask), but I think it was "Four."

http://thebadplus.typepad.com/dothemath/ Great stuff in this Q-and-A with Ethan Iverson. The discussion of "feathering" the bass drum is particularly intriguing to me, plus the insight into the personalities of the MJQ and the stories of traveling with Bobby Timmons ...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/arts/mus...ml?_r=1&hpw I trust this news will be of interest: Wolfgangsvault.com (a site I was previously not aware of) has acquired tons of previously unissued historic Newport tapes and starting Wednesday will post free streams from 1959, beginning with Basie, Blakey and Dakota Staton and continuing in the next week with Monk, Horace Silver, Ahmad Jamal, Joe Williams. The story says hundreds more could be online in the future.

Sorry to play the role of the board's policman and tattle-tale, but copying and pasting entire articles from any source -- newspaper, blog, whaterver -- is both a violation of copyright law and board rules. Please tease to the story with a couple of paragraphs and then provide a link. If you can't link directly to the blog post, get us to the site and have us scroll. It's the fair, honorable and lawful approach. Thanks

Unlikely that the Mosaic would do a set that would include the late '80s-early '90s stuff, plus the 1974 and 1965 one-offs just because they all appeared on domestic or foreign RCA. Mosaic genearlly likes each package to be more focused, unified, around a smaller period, band or aesthetic. Having said that, you might argue that the 74 record belongs as a precursor to the later sextets. Still, a better bet and an excellent set would be just 1987-91, which would include the five original LPs/CDs. But even that leaves the Waldron-Lacy duet record as a kind of an odd-man-in among the other sextet/quintet records. I wonder if the four ensemble recordings could be squeezed into a 3-CD Select. On a related note, it would be great to have all the duets with Mal Waldron in one place, including the RCA, several great Hat Hut records and, apparently, an early '70s record on Japanese Victor that I've never heard. That would be a killer Select too, but probably tough to lasso the rights from so many sources.

On one of those sweeps through Illinois, that band played Champaign-Urbana, and the Chicago bassist Kelly Sill, a student at the University of Illinois in those days, once told me a story about how Mingus was in Chicago with a night off before the C-U gig so he called the club to find out who was playing and learned that it was the Memphis Nighthawks, which was a '20s style hot-band that was getting some attention at the time with Ron DeWar on soprano and clarinet and the late Steve Jensen on trumpet. http://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Lips-Memphis-Ni...8298&sr=1-1 I wish I could remember all the details of the story, but the highlights include the fact that Mingus drove down that day, loved the group, accidentally started a fire at his table and ended up dancing with pianist Kelly Brand (now Kelly Sill's wife).

I saw this exact band in Detroit about a year-and-a-half ago and it matches this description in every detail. (Though I'd call it post-bop rather than hard-bop.) Anyway, to add one thing I really found interesting. I had previously heard every one of the sidemen in person, except for Grissett, whom I knew from records, but without exception, they all sounded like stronger, more mature and individualistic players in the context of Harrell's band than in any other situation. To me, that says something profound about the strength of the material and Harrell's ability to craft a band in his own image.

Late to the party, but if I had to pick five, here they are in the basic order in which I find myself listening to them: 1. Let My Children Hear Music 2. Black Saint and the Sinner Lady 3. Changes One (plus first side of Changes Two) 4. Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus 5. Mingus Ah Um I too have great affection for the Adams-Pullen band and, from this distance, having never heard Mingus live, I might well choose that band as my favorite. There's just something very special about the combination of some of Mingus' most compelling material, the chemistry with those individual personalities, Mingus' maturity and the particular sort of balance of freedom and discipline. That's a band that truly breathes as one. Loose but super locked-in and never spilling over into sloppy. Also for what it's worth, I would probably listen to Black Saint and Changes more than Let My Children (as great as it is), but the latter is my wife's favorite so it gets the most spins at home. I consider myself fortunate to be married to a Mingus fan.

Re: earlier discussions of Asperger's syndrome in this thread: Interesting piece in today's New York Times about various issues surrounding the diagnosis of the condition and its relationship to other forms of autism. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/health/0...ml?_r=1&hpw

I have bootleg cassette of Steve Grossman, Tom Harrell, Kenny Barron, Buster Williams and Billy Hart whose origin is a mystery to me, though I recall being told at some point that it was from the Vanguard. Can anyone confirm this or otherwise identify any more details? There are just two tunes: a blues and "Star Eyes." There is no indication of the date.

Just a footnote to this discussion of Jug: I always thought you could solve a lot of the issues in jazz education if you just firebombed all the top schools with copies of "Jug" and "Boss Tenor."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/17/nyregion....html?ref=music