Where Is Everybody?
Jun 23, 2011 For Sale
OK, so I did that post the other day, offering to dig deep into my collection to sell rare vinyl, and offering the opportunities to pick up many, many other records for reasonable prices. I expected to be inundated with phone calls and emails. So far, I’ve had one call, from our old friend CeeDee, and one email, from a new reader who doesn’t have much money to spend and may or may not be interested in coming out to Western Nassau county. What gives? What was it about my original posting that has failed to pique any interest from the dozens/scores/hundreds of jazz collectors in the New York area who, you’d figure, would be interested in seeing what was for sale at least out of curiosity? I’m perplexed, but sanguine. It’s not like I’m desperate, but I really thought the phone would be ringing off the hook.
Massive Jazz Vinyl & Collectible Sale — NOW!
Jun 21, 2011 For Sale
Imagine this: The greatest jazz vinyl store in the world. A cross between Dayton’s of the 1970s and the Jazz Record Center of today. Dozens of original Blue Notes. Scores of additional rare LPs, from Donald Byrd on Signature to Sonny Criss on Imperial to Lester Young on Aladdin. Plus hundreds of less-rare-but-moderately-priced records from the annals of jazz.
Imagine no longer. It is here, it is now and it is happening. For three weeks only.
Welcome to the one-time-only Jazz Collector Record Store.
This is the story:
In three weeks the lovely Mrs. JC and I are moving from our spacious home on Long Island to two locales, our lake house in The Berkshires and a much less spacious apartment in Manhattan. I plan to take as many records as possible with me, but I would like to divest of many records and other jazz collectibles before the moves as well.
I have 2,000 records in my basement for sale. These are mostly later pressings and reissues, but they will be moderately priced. For instance, I have about 50 Japanese and Liberty Blue Notes I will be selling for $10 each. I also have beautiful jazz posters and artwork, hundreds of jazz books, hundreds of jazz magazines, hundreds of CDs. Many are for sale.
Fine, but nothing to go nuts about, right?
I will also be willing to dip into my jazz vinyl collection. Deep into my collection, depending upon the records and the prices. How deep? I’ll consider selling major collectibles, such as an original Jutta Hipp on Blue Note, Kenny Dorham at the Café Bohemia on Blue Note, Sonny Criss on Imperial, Donald Byrd on Signature, Joe Henderson, Andrew Hill, Stanley Turrentine, Blue Notes all. I will not sell my Trane, Rollins, Dexter, Miles, Adderley, so don’t ask. But I may be willing sell some of my McLeans, Hubbards, Fullers or Mobleys. I will even sell my autographed 78 of Moody’s Mood for Love – but only to Don-Lucky because it has been promised to him.
Here are the conditions:
- Do not expect bargains. I will sell records from my collection for prices slightly below what you will see on eBay or on the Jazz Collector Price Guide. The advantage is you get to see, touch and, if you want, listen to the record before purchase. There will also be many moderately priced collectibles.
- Do not haggle. If you don’t like the price, don’t buy the record. If I tell you I won’t sell it, please put it back on the shelf.
- In-person only. I’m not selling these records by mail. This sale is being conducted from my home, by appointment only. My house is quite easy to get to by car or train. Be polite and respectful, please.
- No personal checks, no credit cards. Cash and Pay Pal only.
If you are anywhere around the New York area between now and July 14 I strongly suggest you make an appointment. Jason, this would be worth a trip from Massachusetts. Don-Lucky, this might be a time to plan that long-promised trip to New York. Any collectors or dealers from Japan, if you’re in New York, this will be worthwhile. I have thousands of great jazz records and I’m in a mood to cut back. I don’t need the money, it’s just psychological: I want to downsize my life. Once I get settled in my new homes, I imagine my mood will change and I’ll regret selling every single record I sold.
One more warning: There will be a challenge finding dates to fit people in: Because I’m moving, I may not be around a lot the next couple of weekends, but during the week the appointment book will often be clear.
You can e-mail me at the usual place, al(at)jazzcollector.com to make an appointment, or you can call my home office, 516 467-4276. Good luck and I hope to see some of you soon. For those of you who can’t make it in person, I will be happy to provide updates on Jazz Collector.
Jazz Collector Back In Business (Sort Of)
Jan 26, 2011 Autographs, Blue Note, For Sale
There was a time, as many of you know, when I was selling records regularly on eBay to clear out duplicates and winnow down my collection. I was selling so regularly, in fact, that I became both a Power Seller and a “Top-Rated Seller” on eBay under my “nom de ebay” AJdoctor. Nearly a year ago, however, I stopped. I had started a new business – a real one, a one that actually pays the bills – and it started taking off last March, which is when I stopped posting records on eBay. And once I stopped it was hard to get started again. In the meantime, however, I, of course, kept accumulating records. I purchased a collection this summer of mostly traditional records and I purchased another small collection just a few weeks ago, with a bunch of Blue Notes of mostly later vintage. The point is, I still have many, many more records than I either need or have room for, so, as of yesterday, I am back to posting records on eBay. I started with a couple of Blue Notes and even put up some interesting blues records that I purchased in the collection this summer. Here are a couple of samples:
Tags: Dexter Gordon, Perry Bradford
Jazz Collector Store: 25% Discount on Everything
Mar 11, 2010 For Sale
Here’s a heads-up to all my friends at Jazz Collector. If you want to purchase any of my items on eBay now, I am offering a 25 percent discount. You can just go to the top of the page for Items for Sale and take a look. There are about 90 items currently in my eBay Store. Also, remember I do combined shipping, so if you buy three or four items in the U.S., the shipping remains very inexpensive.
Here’s the method to this madness. First off, I wanted to thank everyone for their good wishes and keeping the site going while I was away. Second, eBay has changed its pricing policy for anyone who is running a store on the site. It’s interesting the way they do things, because I received this very nice email congratulating me because they were reducing prices and upgrading my store listings. It turns out that this was, as you might expect, a bit of a
Rare Sonny Rollins & Kenny Dorham Available Here
Jan 13, 2010 For Sale
Okay, here’s an interesting one for you. Back in the early 1970s there was this this guy in New York who had a massive collection of audio tapes that he would record from radio broadcasts. For a while he would issue these tapes on bootleg LPs under a variety of names. I have at least a couple of dozen of these issues, under labels such as Alto Records and Ozone and Session Disk, by a large number of artists such as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Ella Fitzgerald, Coleman Hawkins and many others.
He also, apparently, had tapes that were never issued in any format — and we’ve discovered one of them here. Not only that, but it’s quite a legendary performance by a legendary group of artists: Max Roach with Sonny Rollins and Kenny Dorham, recorded Dec. 12, 1956 at the Cafe Bohemia just seven months after the tragic accident that claimed the lives of Clifford Brown and Richie Powell.
This is the story: One of our friends and faithful Jazz Collector readers visited with the guy who had the tapes back in the 1970s and made a copy, on a reel-to-reel tape, of two
Tags: Max Roach, Sonny Rollins
On eBay Now: A Few Prestiges, Plus
Jan 11, 2010 For Sale, Prestige
We’ve been spending some time cataloguing our records and making decisions about what to keep and what to sell on eBay. The result is that we’re putting some interesting records on eBay that are not duplicates, but are items from our collection. This week it turns out a lot of the records we put up are from the Prestige label, including:
Dorothy Ashby and Frank Wess, In A Minor Groove, New Jazz 8209. We saw a copy of this sell for about $150 a few weeks ago and figured we’d give ours a shot. So far this one has no bids at $30 with just a few hours to go. If it doesn’t sell, we’ll be happy to keep it: We were quite ambivalent about selling it in the first place. There aren’t that many jazz harp LPs to begin with, and this is a good one.
Thelonious Monk, Monk’s Moods, Prestige 7159. This one is similar to the Early Miles LP we also have up on eBay now. It’s an early reissue of classic music, with nice packaging and it’s part of the early yellow-label Prestige catalogue. As we had mentioned last week,
Tags: Dorothy Ashby, Frank Wess, Jazz Vinyl, Miles Davis, New Jazz Records, Thelonious Monk
On EBay: A Few From Impulse
Nov 17, 2009 For Sale, Impulse, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay
We’ve been very busy with eBay the past couple of weeks — putting records on eBay is what we often do when we are procrastinating from other work, so this would be the evidence that we’ve been in heavy-duty procrastination mode. Anyway, our neurosis is your gain: This week we’ve had 70 items on eBay, several of which closed yesterday, many more of which close today, and a few more of which close tomorrow. Part of what we have up there now is a nice batch of Impulse LPs we’ve either pulled from our own collection, or pulled from the collection we purchased in Trenton back in May. Here are a couple of examples:
Archie Shepp, Four For Trane, Impulse 71. This is an original orange label pressing in nice VG+ condition. It is closing later today and is currently at $40. Also from the same batch is this:
Tags: Archie Shepp, John Coltrane, Yusef Lateef
Jazz Vinyl Countdown: John Coltrane, Ballads
Nov 3, 2009 For Sale, Impulse, The Great Jazz Vinyl Countdown
No, I am not thinking about getting rid of one of my all-time favorite records. No, this is a question about what to do with multiple copies. As noted in the headline, the record is: John Coltrane, Ballads, Impulse 32. I have had two original pressings of this record, one a mono and one a stereo. To me, this makes sense. But recently I purchased a second stereo copy of the record, this one a reissue. I have to be honest. The reissue sounds as good as the original. So I’m going to sell my original stereo pressing, and I’m going to first offer it here at the Jazz Collector site. It’s not a high-end collectible like Blue Train, but it’s a wonderful record, beautiful and romantic with a great selection of songs. It features Trane with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones.
Tags: John Coltrane
On eBay: Johnny C, Seldon Powell, Clifford Brown
Nov 3, 2009 For Sale, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay, Prestige
There’s quite a lot of nice jazz vinyl to watch on eBay this week. So many records, so little money.
I’m always pleased to find a record I’ve never seen before. I’ve been collecting jazz records for nearly 40 years, I’ve been to hundreds of record stores in the U.S. and Europe, I’ve been on eBay quite consistently for at least six or seven years. And even still, there are records that are new to me. Here’s one, on eBay now: Johnny Coles, The Warm Sound, Epic 16015. This is an original mono pressing with the yellow label. It looks to be in M- condition, based on the seller’s description. The current price is $200 and there’s more than two days to go.
We also have a few records for sale this week, including a few of the ones that passed through our Jazz Vinyl Countdown, such as: Seldon Powell Sextet, Roost 2220. This one is in nice VG+ condition for the vinyl and VG++ condition for the cover. Michel warned us not to sell this one and perhaps he was right. The current price is
Tags: Clifford Brown, Epic Records, Euclid Records, Johnny Coles, Roost Records, Seldon Powell
Jazz Vinyl Countdown: Jackie For Sale
Oct 13, 2009 Blue Note, For Sale, Jazz Vinyl, The Great Jazz Vinyl Countdown
We had mentioned seeing this record on eBay the other day: Jackie McLean Consequence, Blue Note King GFX-8172. This is a 1965 record that was not issued in the United States and was, in fact, issued on this Japanese pressing for the first time. It’s a nice record featuring Jackie with Lee Morgan, Harold Mabern, Herbie Lewis, Billy Higgins. The first track, Bluesanova, is slightly Sidewinder-like and there’s a nice medium tempo version of My Old Flame. We didn’t realize it was a valuable collectible until we saw the copy on eBay at more than $100: It eventually sold for $185.50. That copy was in M- condition for both the record and the cover. Our copy is M- for the vinyl and VG++ for the cover (there’s a little wear around the edges). In any case, we are going to try something a little different with this record: We are going to
Tags: Jackie McLean, Jazz Vinyl
Now Available: Vintage Autographs, High End Audio
Oct 12, 2009 Autographs, For Sale
We get all kinds of random inquiries here at Jazz Collector. We’ll post a few here, in case anyone is interested or has any comments.
One of our readers has a set of three vintage photos, autographed, framed and mounted. All three photos appear to be made out to Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis. The signatures are from Dizzy Gillespie: “To my Dixieland friend — Dizzy G” (that’s what it is, although it would be tough to associate Lockjaw with Dixieland); Dave Tough: “To Jaws, Dave Tough;” and Sidney Catlett: “Blow that horn Jaws! — Sidney Catlett.” It is certainly an interesting piece of jazz memorabilia. If you are interested drop us at note at al@jazzcollector.com and we’ll put you in touch with the seller.
Another of our readers is moving from New York to California and has a batch of high-end audio equipment he is looking to sell. This includes a Klyne pre-amp; B&K stereo amp; Carver tuner; Sota turntable; Sumiko tonearm; Snell speakers and
Tags: Dave Tough Autograph, Dizzy Gillespie Autograph, Lockjaw Davis, Sidney Catlett Autograph
More on J.R.: Original Audio
Aug 11, 2009 78-RPM Records, For Sale
OK, here’s an audio track from the J. R. Monterose acetates. He’s doing “I’m Confessin’ That I Love You” and he sounds pretty darn good. If this is really 1944, then he would have been 17 at the time. Enjoy. sample-jr-monterose-1944
Tags: JR Monterose
More J.R. Monterose: Extremely Rare Recordings Available
Aug 11, 2009 For Sale
Okay, I promised you something cool on J.R. Monterose. I got a note the other day from a guy who has one-of-a-kind aluminum core acetate recordings J.R. made as a teenager. He got these from the estate of J.R.’s wife. They are 78s, of course, from the mid-1940s, and there are 12 altogether. Well, I’ll just let you read the note he sent me:
“Hello. A few years ago I attended an estate sale in Utica NY of the late wife of JR Monterose. I purchased a stack of old records and in them were some aluminum core acetate (Wilcox Gay recording) albums of JR playing when he was a teenager. These are the only recordings of their kind for this artist (app.1944) I took the recordings to Syracuse University Belfer audio lab where they
Tags: John Coltrane, JR Monterose
Stomp Off Records For Sale
Jul 10, 2009 For Sale
So I’ve been talking about how often I now receive inquiries from people looking to sell records or other collectibles, and I posted the Andy Warhol autograph and Blue Note 78s earlier this week, and no one out there has expressed interest yet, and still the inquiries keep coming in. Here’s one from a guy in the U.K. who has 350 records from the Stomp Off record label. He also has three brochures as part of the collection. He has no idea what he wants for these, but it looks like he would be interested in selling them all at once. If anyone is interested, drop me an email at al@jazzcollector.com and I’ll put you together with the seller. By they way, I don’t get a commission on any of these things: It is my goal in life to make Jazz Collectors happy the world over and, for me, that is reward enough. Or something like that.
Tags: Stomp Off Records
More Peak Prices, Plus Miles, Sonny, Trane For Sale
Jun 30, 2009 Blue Note, For Sale, Impulse, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay, Prestige
In mentioning records reaching new price peaks, I inadvertently left out a couple of records among the ones I’ve sold recently. These aren’t records we’ve tracked often, but we haven’t seen higher prices for either of them:
Granchan Moncur III, Some Other Stuff, Blue Note 4177. This was a New York USA pressing. The record was M- and the cover was VG++. It sold for $223. 70.
Anthony Williams, Spring, Blue Note 4216. This was also a New York USA pressing in beautiful condition, M- for the record and VG++ for the cover. This one sold for $202.50.
We have a bunch of records up on eBay now, although none will fetch those kinds of prices. Here are a few of the records that are available:
John Coltrane (et al), Wheelin’ and Dealin’, Prestige 7131. This is an original pressing, with the New York
Tags: Anthony Williams, Grachan Moncur, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins
78s Anyone?
Jun 17, 2009 78-RPM Records, For Sale
Does anyone out there collect 78s? I mention this because, over the past several weeks several people have gotten in touch with me with 78s to sell and I’m not sure what kind of market there is for them. I’ll pass along some of the information and we’ll see what happens. The most interesting of the items is the Norman Granz project called The Jazz Scene, which is a packaged set signed and numbered by Norman Granz. The owner of this item described it as being in mint, immaculate, unplayed condition. It is number 2747 of a series of 5,000 copies. We’ve seen this sell for a lot of money on eBay, but it’s not something we’ve tracked in the Jazz Collector Price Guide. The following is a description of the item from the seller:
Tags: Norman Granz
For Sale: Louis Armstrong Autograph
May 19, 2009 Autographs, Books/Magazines, For Sale
I just posted an interesting item on The Jazz Collector Store on eBay: A copy of the Louis Armstrong autobiography Satchmo, My Life In New Orleans, which is autographed by Louis Armstrong. It is signed in large print on the title page: “To Joel From Satchmo Louis Armstrong.” The Satchmo is underlined. I have a receipt stating that I paid $270 for this item nearly 10 years ago, but I just posted it for $200. I did a quick search on eBay and there are not that many Armstrong autographs available and none quite as strong as this one, since it is an inscribed autobiography. Since the item is in the store and not up on auction, it could go fast, so I wanted to make sure I gave a heads-up to all of you who read Jazz Collector in case you wanted to grab it. If you buy it and tell me you read about it at Jazz Collector, I’ll give you an additional $10 discount. Can’t beat that.
Tags: Louis Armstrong
This Week on Ebay: Miles, Clifford, Trane
Apr 2, 2009 Books/Magazines, For Sale, Impulse, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay, Prestige
We haven’t been very active selling on eBay lately: Just life getting in the way. However, this week we found some time to clean and post a bunch of items. It’s a mixed bag, but there are a few nice ones, including:
Miles Davis, Blue Haze, Prestige 7054. This is an original New York yellow label Prestige. It’s in VG+ condition, and sounds quite nice. We put a start price of $30 and it’s already received a bid, so we expect there to be some action.
We also put up a nice-sounding original copy of Clifford Brown, Jam Session, Emarcy 36002. This also has a start price of $30. It’s a great record, with a lot of positive energy.
As you may have noticed on the Jazz Collector site, we’ve been going through some old Downbeat Magazines, looking for collectibles (we’re even giving one away). We’ve put a few up for sale in our eBay story, and we put a very interesting one up for auction yesterday. It is:
Tags: A Love Supreme, Clifford Brown, Downbeat Magazine, Emarcy Records, Impulse Records, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman
The Resurgence of the Resurgence
Mar 30, 2009 For Sale
A few weeks ago we decided to try something new on the site: We put up a record for sale at what we thought was a fairly low price. The record was The Resurgence of Dexter Gordon, Jazzland 929S. This was (and still is) an original stereo pressing. The record and the cover are both in VG++ condition. We put a $25 tag on it, figuring someone would jump on it quickly. But no one did, and still no one has. Part of the reason we were doing this to see if our new e-commerce plug-in was working. We still don’t know. So here’s what we’re doing. We’re lowering the price of the record to $15. If you’re interested, click here and follow the link. We have just the one copy. Once it’s gone, that’s it. Hopefully someone will be interested in a bargain, and hopefully the system will work.
Tags: Dexter Gordon, Jazzland Records
Today on Ebay: Fuller, Parlan and McCoy (For Sale)
Mar 25, 2009 Autographs, Blue Note, For Sale, Impulse, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay
SHHHHHHHHHH. It’s so quiet on eBay today we wouldn’t want to disturb any of the sleeping buyers and sellers. I have a sense that the economy is starting to wreak a little havoc on the jazz collectibles market — not on the high-end collectibles — but in the mid-tier. We’ll see. These things tend to go in cycles. Perhaps it’s a good time to be buying. Anyway, it is quite quiet on eBay today, but there are a few things worth noting, including:
Curtis Fuller, Bone and Bari, Blue Note 1572. This is an original pressing in M- condition, both record and cover, and it features an autograph by Curtis Fuller. Not to mention the presence of Sonny Clark on piano. The opening bid price for this record is about $140 and, as of now, there are no bids. In the Jazz Collector Price Guide we’ve seen this record sell for nearly $700 in M- condition without an autograph. So maybe it is a time to be buying.
Tags: Curtis Fuller, Horace Parlan, McCoy Tyner, Round Again Records
Today on Ebay: Hank, Dex and John Lewis
Feb 17, 2009 For Sale, Jazz Vinyl, Jazz Vinyl on eBay, Savoy
That last post I wrote, Ebay versus the storefront, was inspired by my experience looking ahead on eBay today and not seeing any of the rare Blue Notes or other heavy-duty collectibles for awhile. And I thought: Will there ever come a time when you go onto eBay, and those records are no longer there, just as they are generally no longer in our local record stores? Could it happen, that we would no longer be able to count on eBay to fulfill our vinyl fantasies? Just a thought. Anyway, back to reality, I did find some records worth watching today, and here are a few:
Hank Mobley, Jazz Message #2, Savoy 12092. This is an original red label pressing that looks to be in nice VG++ condition, both record and cover. The current price is about $160.
Tags: Dexter Gordon, Hank Mobley, Jazzland, John Lewis, Pacific Jazz
Item For Sale: The Resurgence of Dexter Gordon
Jan 28, 2009 For Sale
Okay, we’re trying something new: Selling a record right off of the Jazz Collector site rather than through eBay. Here’s the idea: We’d like to offer some records at fair prices to our readers in hopes of building some traffic and building some reader loyalty. The problem is, most of these will be one-of-a-kind items. Our plan, unless someone has a better idea, is to offer each item on a first come, first served basis: That is, whoever wants it and pays for it first, gets it. The first record for sale on the Web site is this one: The Resurgence of Dexter Gordon, Jazzland 929S. This is an original stereo pressing with the black label and deep groove. The record is in VG++ condition and sounds great. The cover is also VG++, with a very small tear on the back. The price for this record is $25. Our standard shipping rates apply: $4 for the U.S., $8 for Canada; $15 for Europe, and $17 for Asia. We’ve added an e-commerce plug-in to the site, so we hope this will work, assuming somebody wants to buy this nice LP for this very fair price. If you want to buy it, just click the article and follow the shopping cart instructions.
Tags: Dexter Gordon, Jazzland
