When Dexter Gordon first came back and recorded for Blue Note in the 1960s, his first two dates were Doin’ Allright and Dexter Calling. His next recording was as a sideman. To whom was he a sideman, and what was the name of the LP? Extra credit: Who were the other musicians? You can look it up, but it’s more fun if you don’t.
We had a couple of hours to kill last night, so we did something we used to do every day: Scroll through a full 24 hours worth of jazz records listed on eBay. It was good timing, because we found some nice items for our Jazz Collector readers and one item we plan to bid on for ourselves.
Our friends at Euclid Records have a nice batch closing today, including: Kenny Drew Trio, Riverside 224. This is an original white label pressing and is listed in M- condition for both the record and the cover. The current price is $1,256, so, Kenny Drew, welcome again to the $1,000 bin. Also from Euclid is The Tal Farlow Album, Norgran 1047. This is the 12-inch version with the beautiful cover by David Stone Martin. It is in M- condition for both the record and the cover and is currently in the $60 price range. My friend Dan Axelrod, who was Tal’s good friend and protege, swears that the 10-inch version of this record offers far better sound quality than the 12-inch version. I suppose that’s why he has more than a dozen copies of the 10-inch version. Nonetheless, the 12-inch Tal Farlow Album is quite lovely to listen to and quite collectible and is certainly a worthy addition to any collection.
It always pays to read the eBay listings carefully. Here’s an example why:
Is it possible someone could be reading Jazz Collector and not own a vinyl copy of John Coltrane’s My Favorite Things? Perhaps we’ll find out, because this is the prize in our next free collectible contest. We have a beautiful near mint later stereo pressing of My Favorite Things, Atlantic 1361, which we will be giving away to one fortunate reader of Jazz Collector in two weeks. This, of course, is a classic record and should be a staple of any jazz collection, even if your jazz collection consists of only five records. But maybe there are readers of our site who are newcomers to jazz and coming to learn, or who have somehow missed out on this record, or who would like a second copy to put in another room of their home, or perhaps one to frame and hang somewhere for perpetual inspiration. I, for one, have copies of this record in at least three different rooms in my house, plus another in my lake cottage. But, of course, I am certifiably insane. Nevertheless, if you would like to win a copy of My Favorite Things for any reason whatsoever, all you have to do is . . .
It is quite a week on eBay this week. Yesterday we pointed out two quite compelling Blue Notes for auction and if you were dig a bit deeper you would notice that the seller of the Cliff Jordan-John Gilmore LP, herschel78, has quite a trove of additional treasures. I will point some of these out momentarily. We have also received an email from a seller named pretovelho, who has just put up about 200 records, including a large number of Blue Notes, some of which will will point out here as well. We are also putting up a few nice records under our nom-de-ebay AJDoctor, one of which is the first Moondog LP on Prestige, entitled Moondog, Prestige 7042. This one is in nice shape and already has a bid of $99. As for some of the other choice items we’ll be watching this week, here is a sampling:
The Eminent Jay Jay Johnson Volume 1, Blue Note 1505. This is an original Lexington
Got home late yesterday afternoon from Providence, where my son had directed a play (quite well done, I must say) and popped onto eBay to see what was there for my friends at Jazz Collector. As soon as I did my normal search under jazz records, the first two items that popped up were real beauties: Lee Morgan, Volume 3, Blue Note 1557 and Cliff Jordan/John Gilmore, Blowing in From Chicago, Blue Note 1549. Both of this records are listed in near mint condition and both sellers promise that you will never see a better copy. Digging a little deeper, the seller of the Jordan LP has a bunch of other, similar, high-end beautiful condition jazz collectibles on auction this week. It promises to be an interesting week, with a few more additions to the $1,000 bin. It is my expectation that each of these records will sell for more than $1,000 — in fact,
When I first became aware many years ago that there was actually a sub-culture of jazz collecting and collectible jazz records, one of the first of the “rare” jazz records I heard about was Tommy Flanagan Overseas, Prestige 7132 (I was not aware of the Metronome version). In all the early years of collecting and searching for records in the bins of hundreds of record stores around the world, I never saw a copy of this record. By the time I did find a copy, by then the collectibles market had taken off and the price tag was out of reach. I’ve looked on eBay for affordable copies, but, somehow the words “eBay” and “affordable” don’t always go together. I’m content now to watch the record sell and listen, if I desire, to my very fine Japanese pressing. This is all a long way toward getting to the point, which is:
I hadn’t updated the $1,000 bin in a while, so I went searching for interesting new items and I came upon this: J. R. Monterose In Action + The Joe Abodeely Trio, Studio 4. According to the seller, this original pressing was one of approximately 250 issued and sold from the cloak room of Abodeely’s The Tender Trap night club in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. It was also described as an original Columbia pressing from Rock Island, Ill. The record and the cover were both listed in VG++ condition and the price was $1,703.98. In addition to the price tag, what caught my attention was the memory somewhere deep in the back of my recesses of my brain that I actually own this record. So, I ran downstairs, trailed excitedly by my dog Marty, and searched through the shelves of Part II of my collection and there it was, sitting there. I pulled out the copy, ready to bask in the glow of a $1,700 record. But, alas, to my chagrin the copy I pulled out was
It’s been a couple of weeks since we posted our latest contest for a free collectible, so it is time to announce the winner. The item is Red Rodney, Bird Lives, Muse 5371. This is a 1989 pressing of a 1973 recording and, in addition to Rodney, features Charles McPherson, Barry Harris, Sam Jones and Roy Brooks. What is interesting about this LP, in addition to the fine music and the fitting tribute to Charlie Parker, is that this is a copy that is still in its original factory seal, not bad for a record 20 years old. As always, the criteria to be considered eligible to win the contest is to comment somewhere, anywhere on the Jazz Collector site. As we’ve mentioned many times, our only goal is to encourage people to comment so we can build a nice community of people interested in the jazz collectibles market and we can share information and experiences. For this record, we have eight eligible Jazz Collector readers. They are: Michel, Rudolf, Troy Grooms, Gregorious, Jim Beattie, Jim Thornton, Steve H and Bethellodge. As always, we are having the lovely Mrs J.C. pull the names out of a hat . . . and here she is . . . and here’s the hat . . . and here are the names . . . and here she goes . . . and, finally, the winner is . . .
We try to watch for interesting items at trends at Jazz Collector, and not always on the highest price tags or the Blue Notes. Here’s one we were watching a few weeks ago that we found interesting. The record was: Sidney Bechet with Kenny Clarke, Black Stick, Dial 301. This was an original 10-inch LP and it was listed in VG+ condition, for both the record and the cover. It caught our attention because of the selling price, which was $103.50. Normally even the Bechet’s on Blue Note don’t sell for this price, unless they are original Lexington Avenues in near mint condition. Not sure if this is because of the Dial label, or because of the presence of Kenny Clarke, but it was definitely surprising to see this in the $100-plus range. We had a discussion on the site a few months back about the dearth of demand for some of the earlier artists, so perhaps this is a signal
Mark your calendars for October 23, 24 and 25. Those are the dates for the WFMU Record Fair in New York. This is probably the top record show in the New York Metropolitan area, attracting dealers from all over the country. We’ve been known to occasionally take a table: Actually we’ve done it twice, including last year for just one day. We haven’t decided about this year as a seller, but we’ll probably be there in some capacity and will keep you posted. If you’re a seller and want to reserve a table, our advice is to do so fairly soon, since the room has a tendency to fill to capacity, particularly on the second day of the event. If you want more information, or are interested in signing up, you can just click here for a link to the WFMU web site.
