Dolphy, $800 and Counting

I was watching this record on eBay — Eric Dolphy, At The Five Spot, Volume 1, New Jazz 8260. Wasn’t necessarily planning to bid on it, although at $80 with 24 hours left it seemed like it might be attractive. I was surprised to look this morning and see that the record is up over $800. That’s the highest price I’ve seen for this record. It’s interesting to note whether we’re seeing that with other records as well — new highs — or whether this is just because the record is in great condition and it’s from a very reputable seller. Something to keep an eye on.

Back on EBay

I’m back putting records on E-Bay as AJDoctor. I just put up a nice Jackie McLean LP and I’ve got about 35 records in all. I’ve also been watching a few interesting items the past couple of days. I was surprised to see this Tal Farlow record sell for $91. I love Tal, and I love this record, but I haven’t seen the market this strong for his LPs in a while. I was also watching this Art Blakey LP, which hit a bid of $222 but failed to meet the seller’s reserve price. I know I’ve promised before to be back blogging, so no promises this time. We’ll see how things go.

Interesting Stuff on eBay

Just as an update: I’m not posting regularly for the site yet. I’m a couple of weeks away from resuming selling on eBay and then doing regular posts. For those of you who have found — or re-found — the site, please continue to be patient. Once I’m fully up and running, I’ll be posting every day about interesting jazz collectibles, and I’ll also be selling records here off the site. I’m also hoping to resume my price guides, and get the old ones posted from 2004 and 2005.In the meantime, here are a few interesting items I’ve been watching: Hank Mobley, Blue Note 1568. This one has a $5,500 Buy-It-Now price, which is the highest we’ve ever seen.  Read more

A $2,000 Record

After I posted yesterday’s item about the $1,000 Gil Melle record, I did a quick search of jazz records recently sold on eBay with a price tag of $2,000 or more. The result?  This copy of Jutta Hipp with Zoot Sims on Blue Note 1530 sold for $2,534, with 15 bidders. I also spent some time looking ahead on eBay for the remainder of the day. There’s a nice copy of John Coltrane’s Blue Train coming up later, and one seller has a bunch of nice 10-inch LPs, but the price tags are way high in comparison with their value.  We’ll keep you posted as we find interesting items.

A $1,000 Record

You don’t see too many jazz records selling for more than $1,000. Here’s a recent Gil Melle, Patterns in Jazz, Blue Note 1517, that sold for $1,225. It helped that the record was in mint condition, was an original and was being sold by a highly reputable dealer. Back when I was doing the site regularly, there was huge discussion when a copy of Monk’s Music, Riverside 342, sold eBay for $3,061.50. Here’s what I wrote at the time: Read more

Monk’s Music: The $3,000 Question

In our newsletter last week we re-raised the question about why a copy of Monk’s Music, Riverside 242, recently sold on eBay for more than $3,000. Here are some of the early responses:

 “Hi. Great newsletter by the way. I buy a lot of LPs from Atomic and watched that auction in disbelief. I corresponded with the Atomic crew after the auction asking them if there was something special I didn’t know about this particular LP and they said they were blown away at the price and had absolutely no explanation. My explanation is someone’s pocketbook is bigger than their brain Read more

A Scratch Is A Scratch Is A Scratch

In the Jazz Collector newsletter a few issues back, we asked readers to give advice to eBay sellers. Here’s a comment from one of our subscribers: “I have some advice concerning scratches. Too often the word ‘mark’ is used as a catch-all for scuffs and scratches and whatever. If a scratch is present, call it a scratch. Don’t take if for granted that a non-feelable scratch is inaudible. Often a very thin non-feelable scratch is audible. I even own a few records with very feelable scratches that are actually inaudible. Nothing takes the place of play-grading whenever possible. Also, the definition of a scratch as one that ‘plays through fine’ can mean different things to different people. Some might assume it is completely inaudible, yet it could pop noticeably for a minute. All the seller meant was that it doesn’t skip. Being more precise can result in fewer misunderstandings.” – Elliot Forman

The Bird and Diz Discovery

Three friends called on Monday to ask if I’d seen the article in Sunday’s New York Times about the discovery of the concert by Bird and Diz at Town Hall in New York from June 22, 1945.  Check it out here: Bird Lives! The Birth of Bebop, Captured on Disc. So I get the calls on Monday, rush home, read the article and then head out to my local Tower Records to pick up the CD. Alas, no CD. Also, no CD at Borders, Barnes & Noble or Best Buy.  So I ordered on Amazon. Still waiting for delivery. Which is a roundabout way of saying that I’m delaying the next newsletter a week, till I get back from vacation and have a chance to listen to this CD so I can share my thoughts with you.  I’ve got plenty of other stuff to write about, plus an updated Price Guide, so stay tuned on August 15. I’ll be offline till then, traveling in Europe. Have fun and happy record hunting.  – Al

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