2019: Blue Note's 80th Anniversary

[Pim]

11 minutes ago, soulpope said:

Fair enough .... some good deals are a matter of time - and others will never materialize ....

That is true. I bought: Chico Freeman’s ‘Chico’, Spirit Sensitive and ‘Outside Within’ for 30 dollars al together on a Dutch marketplace. Lee Morgan’s Complete at Hermosa Beach for 8 euros en Cecil McBees ‘Music from the Source’ for 10 bucks... unbelievable!

[soulpope]

4 minutes ago, Pim said:

That is true. I bought: Chico Freeman’s ‘Chico’, Spirit Sensitive and ‘Outside Within’ for 30 dollars al together on a Dutch marketplace. Lee Morgan’s Complete at Hermosa Beach for 8 euros en Cecil McBees ‘Music from the Source’ for 10 bucks... unbelievable!

That`s a number of excellent deals .... but I do understand your stance - when I was in your age I wanted to have all platters ideally in the shortest possible time and was always disppointed about the small(er) number of fails .... nowadays still want to have the music, but patience became gradually part of my learning curve .... I wish you a happy hunting (which is part of the fun !) nevertheless ....

[Niko]

at least, you have easy access to the Utrecht record fair... looked for CDs (and not only LPs) there this November for the first time - some pretty amazing deals (Randy Weston Select for 15, Don Wilkerson BN twofer for 5 and more that I forgot...)

[Pim]

Yes I found some pretty nice stuff there too Niko, this year and last year. Billy Harpers Capra Black for 5 euros for example. 

I remember when I was 15 years old, I really found lots of beautiful stuff in record stores. That was around 2006. Unfortunately my budget was small in those days and I just got started with jazz. But I remember all those RVG’s and nice offers. Nowadays in record stores they got some ‘40 albums on 1 cd’ shit, fake reissues by Andorran labels. A pity...

@soulpope indeed, the hunting is part of the fun. Probably my number 1 hobby I think, which of course causes some friction with my wife, haha. Speaking of great deals: yesterday, I bought Cecil McBees Mutima on cd for only 18 euros. Christmas comes early this year

[soulpope]

2 hours ago, Pim said:

@ soulpope indeed, the hunting is part of the fun. Probably my number 1 hobby I think, which of course causes some friction with my wife, haha. Speaking of great deals: yesterday, I bought Cecil McBees Mutima on cd for only 18 euros. Christmas comes early this year

.....

[Late]

On 12/12/2018 at 7:59 AM, Late said:

Some of the new titles, however, weren't part of the SHM-CD series ... and, in the case of Components, there's no previous RVG remaster, which could mean an entirely new (2018) remaster — which would be nice, as the old (1994?) Larry Walsh remaster is showing its age.

Nope. CD Japan is now showing that the 1994 remaster was used for this 2019 reissue. WTF. Do not buy.

[Dave James]

As much as many of us would like to see obscure sessions reissued, put yourself in Don Was' shoes.  If you're running Blue Note and operating in today's sales environment, how much sense does that make?  if you can move 50 units of a popular artist for every one of someone like Cecil Taylor or Larry Young...well...you do the math.     

[soulpope]

Zev Feldman via Facebook :

BIG TIME, BLUE NOTE! For those of you who haven't heard yet, I'm elated to announce that I'll be working with Blue Note Records as a consulting producer for historical and archival recordings. I will remain co-president of Resonance and still handle day-to-day oversight, but this Blue Note gig will add a very exciting and challenging dimension to my life and I'm ready to roll. In many ways this opportunity has me coming full circle to where my passion for jazz began as a teenager getting my first Blue Note recordings (Lee Morgan's 'Cornbread' & Horace Silver's 'Song For My Father') at 17, which started me on the path to becoming the unabashed jazzhead I am today. I want to give huge props to the great Chris Morris for writing such a gracious story about me and getting the word out there, and of course Don Was and Justin Seltzer for taking a chance on me. I'd also like to thank George Klabin of Resonance for allowing me to pursue this opportunity and giving me the chance to grow, including producing my first record. Looking forward to making great things happen in 2019 and beyond!

[Dan Gould]

"Archival" = unissued sessions??  That would be something but bean counters would still have to approve.

[Ken Dryden]

That's a nice surprise. Maybe Zev will uncover some of the things that Michael Cuscuna couldn't find, no doubt many of which were misfiled or mislabeled, as is always the case when jazz labels get swallowed up by conglomerates.

 

[Dan Gould]

I just remembered - Zev is a big Three Sounds/Gene Harris guy, made the Live at the Penthouse set happen at Resonance as well as the two live dates they released of Gene in the UK.  So maybe this could mean the unissued Sounds tracks could find their way out? Or, combine his love of Gene and Grant Green and put out that date??!!! 

[Brad]

This sounds like very good news.  I bet Alfred would approve!

[kh1958]

https://variety.com/2019/music/news/zev-feldman-blue-note-jazz-don-was-1203101919/

Archival Music Producer Zev Feldman, the ‘Jazz Detective,’ Takes on New Blue Note Role

[Dan Gould]

**************************************************

Feldman will focus on excavating hitherto unreleased music by Blue Note artists.

“I have a whole list of projects I’m preparing for them right now,” Feldman says. “We’re just getting started here. I met with Don and Justin just before the break, and I had a list of 21 or 22 different projects. … I wanted to land on my feet running.”

He adds, “We’ve been talking about tapes that I’ve found by artists ranging from [pianist] McCoy Tyner or [saxophonist] Joe Henderson to [trumpeters] Donald Byrd and Lee Morgan. There are some incredible things that are out there. … I want to be the guy to bring them some ideas — a number of boxed sets, a number of special projects, frontline new releases — and identify some things in the catalog that we can be working on.”

***************************************************************************

[Rooster_Ties]

Trying to not get my expectations all out of whack, but this is some mighty good news no matter how you look at it.

But ignoring my own advice (), is this perhaps the most promising Blue-Note related news in close to a decade?  Trying to think of anything even remotely similar.  IIRC, the last time there were any "new" archival releases on Blue Note, Freddie Hubbard's "Without A Song: Live in Europe" was the first of what was supposed to be a small series of similar, new "archival" live releases on/for Blue Note (Michael Cuscuna himself mentioned a couple other releases were in the works too, in press for the Hubbard, but I'm not remembering anything else that actually surfaced -- ???).

In one interview, Michael mentioned We Montgomery (iirc), and something from/by Andrew Hill.  The Hill thing never happened, but was the Montgomery something Zev later brought out through Resonance??

  BTW, I asked Michael about the Hill when I saw him here at a talk at the Library of Congress ~6 years ago, and he said it was NOT an older, archival Andrew Hill thing -- but something that was (then) much more recent - something Hill recorded in Europe (I want to say maybe some Scandinavian country?), after Hill's resurgence around the turn of the century.  For some reason Finland(?!) of all places, is popping in my head, but it could have just as easily been something recorded in the UK.  Anyway, it never happened.

Or is there anything else I'm forgetting? -- that actually came out on Blue Note -- since this one??  Well, other than the major Monk/Trane thing, of course (which was clearly a one-off, and not part of any sort of series, or effort to start dipping into the archives on any kind of even semi-regular basis).

https://www.discogs.com/Freddie-Hubbard-Without-A-Song-Live-In-Europe-1969/master/611815

Edited January 8, 2019 by Rooster_Ties

[mjzee]

Meh.  Sounds to me like he'll be releasing the rejected tracks.  Probably bring down the label's batting average.

[Dan Gould]

Does anyone else think that for this to happen during the 80th anniversary thing that Zev needed to be hired sooner?  What is the lead time on releases like these? 

The other thing that comes strongly to mind is that these may be unknown live recordings by JoeHen, Mogie, Byrd, and since they were signed to BN at the time, Zev needed to come on board to get them issued on the label?  For example, aside from Blues for Tatum are there any other Morgan sessions known in the discography?  

[JSngry]

I'd be surprised if the bulk of this wasn't live recordings. Best as I can tell, the still-unreleased vault sessions are best left that way.

[Rooster_Ties]

Was Joe Henderson still signed to Blue Note in September 1966??  Only one of these three (3) tracks has ever been released, but I'd love to hear them all.

===============

17 September 1966

Elvin Jones-Joe Henderson Quartet

Performer(s): Jones, Elvin (drums); Henderson, Joe (tenor saxophone); Moore, Don (bass); Hutcherson, Bobby (vibraphone)

 

Inner Urge

Isotope

Shade of Jade

 

===============

 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

His last pre-1985-rebirth BN recording as a leader was January 27, 1966 ("Mode For Joe") and his next date as a leader was for Milestone on August 10th 1967, so he may have been between labels in September of 1966.

[Rooster_Ties]

9 minutes ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

His last pre-1985-rebirth BN recording as a leader was January 27, 1966 ("Mode For Joe") and his next date as a leader was for Milestone on August 10th 1967, so he may have been between labels in September of 1966.

Thx.  FWIW, here's the one track from that set that has been issued (not by Blue Note, though)...

 

[bertrand]

I agree with Dan, It sounds like he may be talking about live stuff.

He does not find these things by himself, BTW.

Edited January 10, 2019 by bertrand

[soulpope]

31 minutes ago, bertrand said:

It sounds like he is talking about live stuff.

He does not find these things by himself, BTW.

So who actually does the "scouting" .... ?

[JSngry]

4 hours ago, Rooster_Ties said:

Thx.  FWIW, here's the one track from that set that has been issued (not by Blue Note, though)...

 

yeah, that'll work.

[Brad]

Years ago, I purchased some cds issued under the Blue Note Collection.  I think it was discussed here, maybe 10 years plus ago.  One of the titles was Dizzy Gillespie Live at the Village Vanguard with Chick Corea and Elvin Jones (two volumes).  I wonder if these types of things are being considered.