Blue Note Catalog deletions

[sidewinder]

In case anyone's interested in how these titles were chosen, I was told that some outside accounting firm was called in to choose the titles for deletion. The Jazz people were not consulted which is why some of the cuts seem so odd.

Which makes it all the more odd that Andrew's titles have escaped the cull - can't imagine that they would be particularly huge sellers. Or maybe they are !

[king ubu]

That part about the copycrap period makes sense... yet I was happy to find some of these titles finally turn up as normal CDRs over here and finally bought them. Maybe they should have allowed some more time - but then I guess time is THE most expensive thing in any kind of business in these crazy times.

[Templejazz]

Damn! This is the wrong time for me to be absolutely BROKE

Some of RVGs like Dippin' and Tomcat I have in their original CD issue and I'd like to upgrade. Never got around to picking up the Herbie Nichols and should probably do that as soon as funds allow.

For the record this kinda sucks and it does make me wonder what the next step for all this music will be. itunes? Emusic or whatever some of those other sites are?

I do think though that some of these will continue to show up after the new year for a little while anyway, especially in Used CD stores.....I hope anyway.

Oh yeah, my two cents on the Kenny Cox Conn........GET IT and get it NOW!! This is a very unique release and I really like to listen to it at least 2-3 times a week.

[king ubu]

With these fast deletions, upgrading is no option any longer. I mostly stopped doing so anyway... because it seems in many cases it's not an upgrade, but just a differently sounding version. Dippin', Tomcat, A.T.'s Delight and the Elmo Hope I all have in the old editions.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

The other side of the deletion binge is the one we all want to avoid - what about future reissues? My guess is we may soon see the end of the CD reissue program.

I wonder if these deletions are why Blue Note suddenly decided to license a whole bunch of classic titles to Analogue Productions for release on hybrid SACD?

[Bluerein]

"On the bright side , at least Jazz isn't suffering as much as Classical. The cuts there are in the thousands."

Yes, but the number of issues is also more than 10 times as large so the percentage might be in favour of classical music after all.

[BruceH]

Cannonball's Jazz Workshop Revisited is fine but far from his best. In light of the deletions, from these Capitol reissues I'd go with, by order of appearance:

Cannonball in Europe - my favourite album by what I think was his best band, the sextet with Lateef - a smoking oboe rendition of "Trouble in Mind" among the highlights

Live at the Lighthouse - a great album by the quintet with Victor Feldman (not enough recordings of the band with him do exist) - this contains "Sack o'Woe" with one of Cannonball's classic solos

Them Dirty Blues - I think there's some disagreement about this one, but I just love it. Cannon's solo on the slow title track is amazing, in addition you get the studio versions of Bobby Timmons' "Dat Dere" and Nat's "Work Song". Piano duties are shared by Barry Harris (a rather unlikely choice, his live debut on Riverside was recorded at the same time as Cannonball's Riverside album "At the Jazz Workshop") and Bobby Timmons.

Cannonball Takes Charge - another fine album, slightly less funk/soul-jazz in orientation, with Wynton Kelly on piano throughout and Chambers/Cobb and Percy/Tootie Heath in support, respectively. Some almost kitsch (Serenata), and another great tune, "Barefoot Sunday Blues" (I think OK admits being accountable for the stupid title - but it sounds like he's rather proud of it...)

Next up the Poll-Winners (his meeting with Wes Montgomery and Shelly Manne, and again there's Victor Feldman here) and JWS Revisited, then finally the - admittedly delightful but still unessential - Cannonball's Bossa Nova. For those interested in Adderley's alto solos, there's some great stuff on the bossa album, to be sure!

As for the later, actual Capitol albums, I'm not quite sure how I'd rate them... they're all good I'd say, but none is absolutely outstanding to me so far (but I'm still waiting for "Domination" to make it and haven't given many spins yet to "Money in the Pocket", "Why Am I Treated so Bad" and the weird Zawinul album). The meeting with Nancy Wilson is a delight (and half of it is just the quintet, "Fiddler on the Roof" is the only readily available album with the Charles Lloyd line-up (but I haven't fully warmed to it yet), and the meeting with Ernie Andrews is one to skip except for diehard fans, I assume (I got it in a sale a couple of months and only gave it one spin so far).

The Poll-Winners is actually one of my most oft-played Cannonball albums.

[BruceH]

There are four I really ought to get in these lists plust two maybes. Not too bad.

Lou Donaldson - Everything I Play Is Funky

Dakota Staton & George Shearing - In The Night

Horace Silver - In Pursuit Of The 27th Man

Horace Silver - You Gotta Take A Little Love (RVG Edition)

Maybes - what about these folks?

Lou Blackburn - Complete Imperial Sessions (Connoisseur Series)

Cannonball Adderley - Jazz Workshop Revisited

MG

YMMV of course, but I'd say the first four are not exactly essential.

The Blackburn and Adderley, however, are damn good.

[Popkin]

The other side of the deletion binge is the one we all want to avoid - what about future reissues? My guess is we may soon see the end of the CD reissue program.

I wonder if these deletions are why Blue Note suddenly decided to license a whole bunch of classic titles to Analogue Productions for release on hybrid SACD?

Speaking of which: has anyone heard anything about upcoming reissues? Are they really going to stop? Are there any plans at all for the immediate future?

[kh1958]

charlie parker - storyville (how does this compare to the washington concert?)

I think Storyville is more interesting... but then it's been among the two or three first Parker discs I've known (thanks to our high school's library).

I don't like the band parts of the Washington that much, but I remember the final few tracks being quite good.

That Washington disc was part of a batch of releases with Bill Evans In Paris Vol. 1/2, Getz/Dailey "Poetry" and I think two by Petrucciani (100 Hearts, Live at the Vanguard). Of those, the OOP Getz/Dailey is the most recommended, one, another beautiful one by Getz, though at a much later point in time than the great Roost sessions.

The Parker Washington disc is essential for the added small group tracks, not the big band tracks. The small group tracks are incredible, Bird is in awesome form.

[Niko]

charlie parker - storyville (how does this compare to the washington concert?)

I think Storyville is more interesting... but then it's been among the two or three first Parker discs I've known (thanks to our high school's library).

I don't like the band parts of the Washington that much, but I remember the final few tracks being quite good.

That Washington disc was part of a batch of releases with Bill Evans In Paris Vol. 1/2, Getz/Dailey "Poetry" and I think two by Petrucciani (100 Hearts, Live at the Vanguard). Of those, the OOP Getz/Dailey is the most recommended, one, another beautiful one by Getz, though at a much later point in time than the great Roost sessions.

The Parker Washington disc is essential for the added small group tracks, not the big band tracks. The small group tracks are incredible, Bird is in awesome form.

just saw i have the four quartet tracks with jack holiday, franklin skeete and max roach on some cheapo compilation... is the disc still essential for me?

[king ubu]

hard to say... I guess I need to play those small group tracks again some time soon! with "band parts" I meant that big band session, of course... I always considered the small group sessions much more interesting, but it's been too long to say if I find them essential...

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

There are four I really ought to get in these lists plust two maybes. Not too bad.

Lou Donaldson - Everything I Play Is Funky

Dakota Staton & George Shearing - In The Night

Horace Silver - In Pursuit Of The 27th Man

Horace Silver - You Gotta Take A Little Love (RVG Edition)

Maybes - what about these folks?

Lou Blackburn - Complete Imperial Sessions (Connoisseur Series)

Cannonball Adderley - Jazz Workshop Revisited

MG

YMMV of course, but I'd say the first four are not exactly essential.

The Blackburn and Adderley, however, are damn good.

As a general rule, I tend to avoid buying "essential" albums, because there are so many really interesting and representative ones among the inessential

One's mileage does, indeed, vary.

MG

[Big Wheel]

All told it look like they're dropping almost 300 titles, but there will still be almost 700 titles in print.

Kevin

Wait a minute. There are only about 150 titles on the first two lists combined. Are you saying there will be another 150 or so in early 2009?

[Kevin Bresnahan]

All told it look like they're dropping almost 300 titles, but there will still be almost 700 titles in print.

Kevin

Wait a minute. There are only about 150 titles on the first two lists combined. Are you saying there will be another 150 or so in early 2009?

I don't know what time frame the 300 titles came from, it's just a number that Michael Cuscuna told me yesterday. It may include stuff that has already been deleted. I'm sure that if more titles get deleted, True Blue will let us know.

Kevin

[BruceH]

As a general rule, I tend to avoid buying "essential" albums, because there are so many really interesting and representative ones among the inessential

One's mileage does, indeed, vary.

MG

Actually, if one buys an inessential album and you find it so interesting that you fall in love with it, then it's ipso facto "personally essential," no? For instance, Davis Cup and Flight To Jordan for me.

(Anyway, if you want to avoid the essential, for godsake don't get any of the Tina Brooks' albums!!)

Edited December 10, 2008 by BruceH

[BruceH]

essential:

Stan Getz - Complete Roost Recordings (3 CDs)

The Complete Blue Note/Capitol Recordings Of Fats Navarro & Tadd Dameron (2 CDs)

The Complete Blue Note Recordings Of Herbie Nichols (3 CDs)

Tina Brooks - Back To The Tracks (Connoisseur Series)

Elmo Hope - Trio And Quintet (Connoisseur Series)

Jackie McLean - New Soil

Charles Mingus - Jazz Portraits (Mingus In Wonderland)

Lee Konitz & Gerry Mulligan - Konitz Meets Mulligan

very good ones:

Art Blakey - At The Jazz Corner Of The World (2 CDs)

Lee Morgan - Live At The Lighthouse (3 CDs)

Lou Blackburn - Complete Imperial Sessions (Connoisseur Series)

Ike Quebec - Complete 45 Sessions (Connoisseur) (2 CDs)

Thad Jones/Mel Lewis - Central Park North

Jon Hendricks - A Good Git Together

Grant Green - Standards

Richard Groove Holmes - Groovin' With Jug (with Gene Ammons)

John Patton - Let 'Em Roll

honourable mention:

Stanley Turrentine - Up At Minton's (2 CDs)

Jackie McLean - A Fickle Sonance (RVG Edition)

Jackie McLean - New And Old Gospel (RVG Edition) (you get Ornette on trumpet all the way...)

Hank Mobley - Dippin' (RVG Edition)

Lee Morgan - Tom Cat (RVG Edition)

Horace Silver - You Gotta Take A Little Love (RVG Edition)

Jimmy Smith - At The Organ, Volume 3 (RVG Edition) (this is part of the earlier 2CD set combining his first three albums, right?)

Lonnie Smith - Turning Point (RVG Edition)

Art Taylor - A.T.'s Delight (RVG Edition)

Grant Green - First Session (Connoisseur Series)

Freddie Hubbard - Goin' Up (Connoisseur Series)

Bobby Hutcherson - Components (Connoisseur Series)

Jackie McLean - Vertigo (Connoisseur Series)

Jimmy McGriff - The Big Band: A Tribute To Basie

Benny Carter - Sax A La Carter

Chico Hamilton - Original Ellington Suite (with Eric Dolphy)

Joe Lovano - Trio Fascination - Edition One (with Dave Holland & Elvin Jones)

Joe Lovano Nonet - On This Day At The Vanguard

Hank Mobley - A Caddy For Daddy

Jason Moran - Black Stars (with Sam Rivers)

Lee Morgan - Caramba

Lee Morgan - Charisma

Lee Morgan - Standards

Charlie Parker - At Storyville

Charlie Parker - The Washington Concerts

Gerry Mulligan - At Storyville (with Bob Brookmeyer)

the jury's still out on:

Introducing Kenny Cox & The Contemporary Jazz Quintet (Connoisseur Series)

maybe I'm too hard on some (Hamilton, Carter, Morgan, Mobley) but it's been a while since I played most of those...

By all accounts, if you're interested in bebop, don't miss the Dameron/Navarro (there's a Definitive substitute of course) and the Nichols (no substitute I know of yet), then add the Hope (he belongs to the same bunch of great pianists around in the early years of modern jazz as Nichols).

McLean's New Soil is one of his best, and so is Mingus' Wonderland album (the first of his band with John Handy/Booker Ervin, Richard Wyands is subbing for Parlan). The Mulligan/Konitz is some of the best Mulligan I'm aware of (and fine Konitz, too! He puts this on a different level than the Mulligan/Baker quartet recordings, I think). And the Getz is pure magic - some of the most beautiful and imaginative playing there is... pure, too.

Between this and the last bunch of deletions, several of McLean's best albums and almost all of Tina Brooks' output goes OOP again. Sad.

Also it makes me worry a bit that recent reissues like two of the Capitol vocal collection albums (Hendricks and Raney), Benny Carter's fine "Sax à la Carter", and recent RVGs like the one by Art Taylor are going OOP so fast!

Wow, I'm in almost complete agreement with your lists.

But as to your last comment, yeah, Sax A La Carter and the Art Taylor albums sure went out of print fast! Seems like I just BOUGHT the Taylor a little while a ago! What a shame. At least most of the Brooks albums have been out there in the marketplace for a reasonable period of time.

[Bluerein]

Don't believe everything MC says.........

[Niko]

Don't believe everything MC says.........

guess i have some idea what this might mean

[televiper]

Don't sleep on the Lou Blackburn. That stuff is gold!

The Herbie Nichols set is sick. A must-have for any jazz piano fan.

All those Blakey records (Like Someone/Witch Doctor/Freedom Rider) are great, especially Like Someone.

Just got those Tina Brooks albums today, so sad they are putting him back out of print. McLean and Morgan are hard hit too.

Everything on Pacific Jazz is pretty much doomed at this point. I gotta get those Jazz Crusaders!

Is the era of easily accessible reissues over?

--------------------------------------------------

http://bopandbeyond.wordpress.com

[RDK]

Is the era of easily accessible reissues over?

On CD, yeah.

But just like when LPs went away (mostly) they'll be some other way to distribute the "software."

[Free For All]

Is the era of easily accessible reissues over?

On CD, yeah.

But just like when LPs went away (mostly) they'll be some other way to distribute the "software."

The biggest drag is the way the cover art, liners and personnel info has gone away- it shrunk from LPs to CDs and now has vanished almost completely with the download age. My students will bring in a recording and I'll ask them "OK, who's on drums, piano etc.?" and they don't know. They have to look it up somewhere, and too many don't bother doing so. When I was their age one of the important parts of listening to and studying the music was to be able to hear the difference between Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. Now many of these key players seem to be becoming anonymous to the younger generation.

Also, I've always thought of an album as a set of tunes that belong together, put in a specific order for a reason (think Speak No Evil). When people download one tune at a time they miss out on that quality, plus they miss out on discovering lesser-known "B side" gems.

I have mixed feelings about the way things are evolving- there are many aspects of convenience in the technology, but it seems like some critical aspects of the "art" are disappearing.

[JSngry]

When I was their age one of the important parts of listening to and studying the music was to be able to hear the difference between Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. Now many of these key players seem to be becoming anonymous to the younger generation.

We're about the same age and came up in a lot of the same ways, so I know what you're saying, and I know how all that makes you feel, because it has made me feel the same way (or worse, not for nothing did Galio & I get along so well...).

But, and I say this after no small amount of wrestling, maybe, maybe it's less important for a 20 year old drummer in 2008 to get inside this shit like we did then because it's less important for them to be/play like those guys now. I mean, ok, we're talking a style that for the sake of broad argument is,,,40 years old. Now, when we were glomming it all in, say, 1978, were we really getting into players from 1938? I mean, I had a reputation at NT for having more Lester Young & Coleman Hawkins sides than anybody (as well as Ayler, AEC, etc, but that was my personal eccentricity, or so it was said...), but to put it in context, one of my buddies one day said, "hey, you're the only guy with any Lester Young sides..." And so I was, and truthfully, at that time, in that place, as evil as it seemed then, it was probably not that evil a scenario, that cats were not too keen on going so far back. They had things to do now, and although the ones who really went on to matter eventually went back, it was because they felt the pull to connect to family, not because they felt that it was..."required" or something.

What I do remember was checking out Sid Catlett the first time, because of Max Roach, who adovocated for Big Sid. Well, hey, if you dig Max, you got to dig Big Sid, and then one thing leads to another. But a lot of cats didn't really dig Max all that much, they thought he was a "bebop" drummer (an easy enough fallacy to swallow in the pre-CD Hear It ALL At Once Golden Age...), and all they wanted to know was Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. They had no time for Max, or Philly, or AT, or Klook, never mind a cat like Denzil Best or Shadow Wilson. And forget about anybody earlier than that, save Buddy Rich. That had all kinda gotten lumped into one compressed "style" thing that you learned if you wanted/needed to, but it was definitely "then", and not readily apparent to have anything to do with right now, which when you're young and on fire is really the only place that matters. And truthfully, as a place to be at a certain time, if you got that going good for you, hey, don't waste it. you got the rest of your life to be old, right? And if the point gets made that there's no more right now left relative to the spiritual continuum as it intersects with the musical, then whoa, that's a whole 'nother point to ponder tight there, if it comes to that.

Like I said, this whole historical myopia really used to bug me, but everything coming full circle now, and with so much of what I thought to be hip and badass in my youth falling into the "established tradition" for today's youth, I can't say that if cats can't look backward because they're too busy looking forward, hey, go ahead on, c'est la vie. Eventually the call to family will beckon to those for whom it should. Seems like shit always works out that way. And for those who won't look back (or ahead) just because they're too lazy or stupid or plain ol' ignunt, hey...there's a niche for everybody, and when there's not, consider the herd thinned.

Back in the day, you came out of the family, because the family was healthy and self-sustaining. The family was there to help you find yourself. Now, you gotta find yourself and then go looking for the family. And truthfully, I don't know that finding them before you've more or less found yourself is such a good thing...

But that's just me.

Edited December 10, 2008 by JSngry

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

(Anyway, if you want to avoid the essential, for godsake don't get any of the Tina Brooks' albums!!)

Had them for ages

(Don't forget, Tina was Bubba Brooks' brother )

MG

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

When I was their age one of the important parts of listening to and studying the music was to be able to hear the difference between Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. Now many of these key players seem to be becoming anonymous to the younger generation.

We're about the same age and came up in a lot of the same ways, so I know what you're saying, and I know how all that makes you feel, because it has made me feel the same way (or worse, not for nothing did Galio & I get along so well...).

But, and I say this after no small amount of wrestling, maybe, maybe it's less important for a 20 year old drummer in 2008 to get inside this shit like we did then because it's less important for them to be/play like those guys now. I mean, ok, we're talking a style that for the sake of broad argument is,,,40 years old. Now, when we were glomming it all in, say, 1978, were we really getting into players from 1938? I mean, I had a reputation at NT for having more Lester Young & Coleman Hawkins sides than anybody (as well as Ayler, AEC, etc, but that was my personal eccentricity, or so it was said...), but to put it in context, one of my buddies one day said, "hey, you're the only guy with any Lester Young sides..." And so I was, and truthfully, at that time, in that place, as evil as it seemed then, it was probably not that evil a scenario, that cats were not too keen on going so far back. They had things to do now, and although the ones who really went on to matter eventually went back, it was because they felt the pull to connect to family, not because they felt that it was..."required" or something.

What I do remember was checking out Sid Catlett the first time, because of Max Roach, who adovocated for Big Sid. Well, hey, if you dig Max, you got to dig Big Sid, and then one thing leads to another. But a lot of cats didn't really dig Max all that much, they thought he was a "bebop" drummer (an easy enough fallacy to swallow in the pre-CD Hear It ALL At Once Golden Age...), and all they wanted to know was Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. They had no time for Max, or Philly, or AT, or Klook, never mind a cat like Denzil Best or Shadow Wilson. And forget about anybody earlier than that, save Buddy Rich. That had all kinda gotten lumped into one compressed "style" thing that you learned if you wanted/needed to, but it was definitely "then", and not readily apparent to have anything to do with right now, which when you're young and on fire is really the only place that matters. And truthfully, as a place to be at a certain time, if you got that going good for you, hey, don't waste it. you got the rest of your life to be old, right? And if the point gets made that there's no more right now left relative to the spiritual continuum as it intersects with the musical, then whoa, that's a whole 'nother point to ponder tight there, if it comes to that.

Like I said, this whole historical myopia really used to bug me, but everything coming full circle now, and with so much of what I thought to be hip and badass in my youth falling into the "established tradition" for today's youth, I can't say that if cats can't look backward because they're too busy looking forward, hey, go ahead on, c'est la vie. Eventually the call to family will beckon to those for whom it should. Seems like shit always works out that way. And for those who won't look back (or ahead) just because they're too lazy or stupid or plain ol' ignunt, hey...there's a niche for everybody, and when there's not, consider the herd thinned.

Back in the day, you came out of the family, because the family was healthy and self-sustaining. The family was there to help you find yourself. Now, you gotta find yourself and then go looking for the family. And truthfully, I don't know that finding them before you've more or less found yourself is such a good thing...

But that's just me.

I think this is one of the essential points to grasp about black music in general. People don't go back; they don't hang around, either; they march on ('til victory is won). I see it happening in different kinds of music in Africa and in different kinds of music in America. I think I see it (though I'm not a great observer of it) in Jamaica, too.

But they always look back to know how far they've come; usually not explicitly, but explicitly with Hip Hop.

MG