Red Rodney - missing Okeh tracks

Here's the four Red Rodney tracks that everyone has been clamoring for these past few months. Somehow they got left off the Okeh compilation I posted, have no idea how but believe me, I am no digital genius.

There is always a silver lining. Just as i went to re record these tracks I ran into recording problems with my cd deck, quickly compounded by some turntable problems. It forced me to take care of these issues and I have a much better set up because of it and my recordings are sounding better than ever. 

And I listened to these tracks with a fresh ear,something I hadn't done in awhile.  So cool, this old school. Here ya go, all fresh and shiny!

1. Dig This Menu, Please

2. Red's Mambo

3. Honeysuckle Rose

4. Buckle My Shoe

Red Rodney - trumpet

Buddy Savitt - tenor sax

Jimmy Golden - piano

Joe Pauline - bass

Jerry Gilgore - drums

Morty Perry - vocals

recorded in NYC circa 9/52

Marian McParland - Live at The Carlyle

Marian McParland's NPR shows were instrumental in my return to jazz. Here's a record I scored at a local junk shop for 3 bucks...signed by the lady herself.
I'm sure it's not gonna turn the world on it's ear but this is really nice stuff. Great standards, a couple of tunes I wouldn't expect and a sweet little original. Enjoy!
.

1. Like Someone In Love

2. Ill Wind

3.One Morning In May

4. Crystal Silence

5. Giant Steps

6. The Surrey With The Fringe On Top

7. Star Eyes

8. A Delicate Balance

9. For All We Know

Marian McPartland - piano
Steve LaSpina - bass
Michael Di Pasqua - drums

recorded live Carlyle Hotel, 9/10/79

Halycon records HAL 117

Dizzy Reece & Ted Curson - Blowin' Away

I really dig this line up. When this was recorded back in '78 I was two years outta high school. We all listened to rock and prog. I was the jazz guy though. Never heard of these guys back then. Ha! What did I know?


  1. Stella by Starlight
  2. All the Things You Are
  3. Bass Conclave
  4. Moose the Mooche
  5. Marjo
  6. Walkin'

Ted Curson - trumpet and flugelhorn (solo  A-2)
Roy Haynes - drums
Sam Jones- bass
Dizzy Reese - trumpet (solo A-1)
Claude Williamson - piano (solo  B-1)

recorded 6/9/78 Blue Rock Studio, New York
produced by Toshiya Taenaka and Fred Norsworthy

1978 Interplay Records  IP-7716

Hamiet Bluiett - Resolution

From sublime to funky to far out, Bluiett covers a lot of ground on this early Black Saint lp.

1. Happy Spirit
 (my inner-self that rarely gets a chance to emerge!)
2. Flux/A Bad M.F.
 (a caricature of Don Pullen - A Giant)
3. Head Drake
 (dedicated to my cousin Calvin Miller)
4. Before Yesterday
5. Spring's Joy
6. "Mahalia" ...No Other One
 (dedicated to Mahalia Jackson - A Great Lady)


Hamiet Bluiett - baritone sax, clarinet, flute, bamboo flute
Don Pullen - piano, organ
Fred Hopkins - bass
Billy Hart - drums, percussion (left channel)
Don Moye - sun percussion (right channel)


1978 Black Saint Records

Charles Tolliver - The Ringer

Here's a groovy lp from 1969. Later reissued as Charles Tolliver and Music Inc. This swings from start to finish. A lucky junk shop find!

1. Plight
2. On The Nile
3. The Ringer
4. Mother Wit
5. Spur

Charles Tolliver - trumpet
Stanley Cowell - piano
Steve Novosel - bass
Jimmy Hopps - drums

Stephane Grappelli plays Cole Porter

 The violin may be my favorite non-traditional jazz instrument and it is very cool to see Cole get the treatment from a monster like Grappelli.
 These are a couple of sessions recorded in Paris in the mid 70's, part of a series of Grappelli sessions under the Jazz In Paris umbrella.
  Enjoyable reworkings of many of the standards but included are a couple of rarities.
Once again I am digging this on the back stoop, warm evening, stars over the mountains. All is a-ok in the world and Cole Porter rules it.

1. It's all right with me
2. You're the top
3. Anything goes
4. In the still of the night
5. You've Got a thing
6. Miss Otis regrets
7. I've got you under my skin
8. Love for sale
9. Easy to love
10. You'd be so nice to come home to
11. Let's do it, let's fall in love
12. My heart belongs to daddy

Stephane Grappelli - violin
Marc Hemmler - piano (1, 7)
Maurice Vander - piano
Eddy Louiss - organ
Luigi Trussardi - bass (1, 3, 5, 7, 8)
Guy Perderson - bass
Jimmy Gourley - guitar
Daniel Humair - drums

recorded May 1975 - 1, 3, 5, 7, 8
recorded Feb 1976 - 2, 4, 6, 9-12

Happy 4th of July - Prez!!

As I mentioned recently, I have been on a bit of a Lester Young kick. Have ya ever read an interview with him?. He was the ultimate hipster. I wanna be as laid back as Prez..

Here's a short set recorded a mere 60 years ago today!!


1. Up 'N Adam
2. I Can't Get Started
3. Lester Leaps In

Lester Young Band

Lester Young - ts
Jesse Drakes - trp
Horace Silver - piano
Gene Ramey - bas
Connie Kay - drums

Birdland - NYC  7/4/53

Jazz at The Philharmonic Chicago 1955

Verve reissued a handful of these records in 1983. Pretty sure they never made the cd transistion. My copy is one of those ARS series that were sent to schools and libraries.

I have been on a bit of a Lester Young kick lately and digging through the lps I found this neglected little gem. Not a major record in anyone's discography but still a cool way to spend a hot summer evening. Hell, Prez doesn't even make the cover!!

Side one is a typical JATP jam session. Side two features the inevitable Oscar Peterson group and a odd outing by Gene Krupa. As much as Peterson leaves me cold, this version of Budo is entertaing.
Dizzy is smokin' as always.

Jazz At The Philharmonic
Chicago Opera House
10.2.55

1. Mail Order Blues
 Flip Phillips, Lester Young, Illinois Jaquet - saxes
 Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Eldridge - trumpet
 Buddy Rich - drums
 Oscar Peterson - piano
 Herb Ellis - guitar
 Ray Brown- bass

2. Anything Goes
3. Baby, Baby All The Time
4. Budo
 Oscar Peterson -piano
 Herb Ellis - guitar
 Ray Brown - bass

5. Drum Boogie
 Gene Krupa - drums
 Eddie Shu - sax & trpt
 Bobby Scott - piano
 Whitey Mitchell - bass


ARS EJ416


* The link has been corrected, You just have to look a little harder.

Mingus Big Band - Fez NYC

I may be slow but this is a classic story... A while back I posted a Mingus Big Band radio show from Glasgow, which incidentally was from a friend in IAJRC. Well, our buddy JD said he had a recording of their return to Glasgow that he wanted to share. I enthusiastically agreed. and then both of us promptly forgot.

Fast forward one year and JC lets me know it wasn't really Glasgow but NYC and did I still want to share?
Well of course. It is also the reason I love doing this. Because there are a handful of music lovers that really care about this stuff. The troll may get me down but this makes it all worthwhile. Thanks JD, for the awesome contribution.. Now I'm gonna let the dude speak for himself ...

The band move through a kaleidoscope of styles with a swinging ferocity that Mingus would have frankly envied. All his life, he craved and rarely had a large ensemble to serve his oversized compositional ambitions. “Charles wanted a band like this desperately,” says pianist and arranger Sy Johnson. “And on a night when the gods are smiling, it is an awesome thing.”
Ms. Sue Mingus, figurehead behind the continuation of the Mingus legacy,  may not have quite her husband’s appetite for public confrontation, but she has mastered the first principle of his working method: demanding from the band the highest level of im perfection. As Mr. Johnson recalls: “Charles had a chaos theory long before the scientists. He would get infuriated if the band really started to swing hard. He felt that the band was being taken away from him. He would get mad and try to fuck it up. He wanted to mix it up, make it uncomfortable for the players so they would reach deeper into themselves.”

Without the benefit of Charles Mingus to trip them up, the Big Band finds its proper level of chaos by having no one specifically in charge of the music. Sue Mingus draws on a pool of maybe 100 first-rate players that on a given night might include trumpeter Randy Brecker, saxophonist John Stubblefield, pianist Kenny Drew Jr. Instead of a lineup, there are fractal patterns of personnel that assume a specific personality for one gig  and then disappear. The constants are a lot of good soloists competing for solo space, the arrangements and Mingus’ own tunes. It adds up to a coherence rare in a big-band world where brass sections still play call-and-response with the reeds. Another way of looking at it is that it all adds up to Mingus.

“He’s dead center in the middle of the music,” Ms. Mingus says. “I think all the musicians feel that way. Sometimes there are specific moments when the bass string will snap at the beginning of a concert, and everyone gets a funny look on their face. He’s still egging people, making these demands. I feel like a mouthpiece for him-I’m the loudmouth in the wings.” Adapted from a web article on the Mingus Big Band at the Fez
This is a set I've been meaning to post for ages, but I simply never got round to finishing the artwork until now. Never mind, it's here now, and it's a real KILLER from start to finish! The Mingus Big Band is, for me, one of the best BBs around; always reliably solid, always enjoyable, but when they're at their best - as here - they're unbeatable. The short recording, some 43 minutes and comprising just four top-notch compositions, comes from early in the band's residency at the Fez in New York in 1998, and was aired by the BBC in (I think) 1999. I've treasured it ever since. Clearly, as Sy Johnson says, the gods were smiling this night, and it is indeed an awesome thing!....JD


1. Moanin'
2. Tijuana Moods
3. Meditations
4. Nostalgia In Times Square

Robert Parker - The Swing Era Small Bands

More crazy goodness. All the big names are here, Django and Dorsey and many more plus a handful of obscurities. Whether you like what he does with these recordings or not, it is very cool to just be able to listen to them. Crackling stuff as Parker will say.

As usual, a pair of 1/2 hour shows. .