Category: Features

More Live Jazz: Isaiah J. Thompson

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I saw a terrific jazz concert the other night here in The Berkshires. The pianist Isaiah. J. Thompson led a quartet playing holiday music, including a familiar batch of songs written by Vince Guaraldi for the “Peanuts” series. I became aware of Thompson during the past few years when he appeared here in Great Barrington with the guitarist/vocalist/raconteur John Pizzarelli. I was extremely impressed with his playing. He has really strong technique and, even better, he really swings. When I saw that he would be appearing with his own group at a relatively new venue in Great Barrington, I got tickets immediately. Read more

Live Jazz, With A Classical Touch

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I saw an excellent jazz concert the other night here in my amazing community of The Berkshires in Western Massachusetts. It was the Ted Rosenthal Trio with Special Guests. The trio being Ted Rosenthal on piano, Noriko Ueda on bass, and Quincy Davis on drums. The special guests being Anat Cohen on clarinet and Sara Caswell on violin. The theme of the concert was “Classics Reimagined.” It featured a number of pieces by classical composers such as Chopin, Dvorak, Beethoven, Satie, Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky, and others reimagined, arranged, and performed as jazz pieces. I know very little about classical music, but I know a lot about jazz and, to me, each of the pieces sounded as if it could have come out of a standard jazz songbook. They closed the set with a Tchaikovsky piece that echoed Diz and Bird right out of the bebop era. There were also beautiful ballads, such as a duet by Rosenthal and Cohen on a Chopin piece called Waltz in E-Flat. Anyway, the trio travels all over the world, so if you ever get a chance to see them, I recommend them highly. Also, if you’re interested in hearing the music, it is available on CD and perhaps other formats under the title Ted Rosenthal Trio, Classics Reimagined: improp2. I walked out of the concert with a copy of the CD. Actually a couple of CDs, as well as a video clip I was graciously allowed to record and subsequently post on YouTube. If you want to listen, here it is: Ted Rosenthal Trio With Guests, Linde Center, Tanglewood, Nov. 28, 2025, Classics Reimagined.

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Favorite Blue Notes, One More Once

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I figure if I keep writing about Blue Notes and putting Blue Notes in the headline, I’ll start scoring well on Google and all of a sudden the many people who have abandoned Jazz Collector in the past year or so will come charging back. Or not. In any case, to follow up on yesterday’s post and some of the comments, I’ve narrowed down my list of Top Ten Blue Notes and I believe I can settle soon on a Top Ten.  Seven of them are known because they were on the list I began compiling in February 2010 (More Blue Note Favorites, Courtesy of Downbeat). Hard to believe that was nearly 16 years ago. My tastes haven’t changed in all those years. Read more

Favorite Blue Notes, One More Time

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So, speaking of my radio show/podcast, I’ve been thinking for a while about doing a show titled “My 10 Favorite Blue Notes.” Three things have stopped me so far: 1. It’s not so easy to identify my 10 favorite Blue Notes; 2. Even if I did identify them, would I want to take them out of the house, bring them in the car, and place the vinyl on the turntables/needles in the radio station’s studio; and, 3. I recall a Downbeat issue from several years ago in which a variety of musicians were asked to name their 10 favorite Blue Notes. I wanted to consult with that issue before doing the show. It would give me more interesting fodder to discuss. My Downbeat collection is sitting up in my attic and combing through them all to find a single issue would be a bit of a hassle.  Of course, it might not be necessary to comb through all of them, now that there is this thing called the internet and this other thing called artificial intelligence. So this morning I got up early and did a search: Downbeat 10 Favorite Blue Notes. What came back was fascinating. Read more

Duets, Anyone?

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It’s been a while since I’ve done a “regular” post. But as you can see, I’ve been very busy doing my two-hour radio show and podcast every week. Listenership at Jazz Collector is way up, but readership is way down. I love doing the radio show and it is really helping me extract more pleasure from and appreciation for my collection. I have no intention of slowing down there. But I would like to do more writing on Jazz Collector now that we are heading into the winter doldrums here in the lovely Berkshire Mountains of Western Massachusetts. One way to do that is to combine my passion for doing the radio show with a renewed commitment to do more writing. So, let’s see how it goes, starting now. Read more

Random Notes from The Jazz Collector Inbox

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Clearing out some emails from the Jazz Collector inbox.

A reader writes that he recently  found a series of Jazz Review magazines at an estate sale. Most of these seem to be from the late 1950s and early 1960s. He’s been selling them on eBay, but if anyone is interested they can contact me and perhaps get access to some of them before they are offered to the general public. This is one of the listings that has already sold: The Jazz Review.

There will be a New Jersey Record Bash this year, June 19-June 21 at the Hilton Garden Inn in Edison, New Jersey. I used to attend this even fairly regularly, sometimes as a vendor, sometimes as an attendee, always as a buyer. It was always a good event, but I haven’t been in years. You can get details at their site 49th Annual Jazz Record Collectors’ Bash.

Speaking of record shows, the WFMU Record fair is back in New York this year, Nov. 8 and 9 at the Metropolitan Pavilion. That was always one of the best shows around, so I’m planning to be in New York for that one, strictly as a buyer. Not looking to sell anything . . . yet. Read more

Golden Grabs in Tokyo

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A few weeks ago, I received an email from a reader named Stuart Levine asking if he could write an article for Jazz Collector about his latest experience at Disk Union “Jazz Tokyo.” Stuart has written some interesting posts in the past and, with me more focused these days on my radio show/podcasts rather than doing regular posting, I figured it would be nice to get another voice in. I was definitely intrigued by the opportunity.  A couple of weeks later, Stuart sent me a photo of Blue Notes galore. A few portions of the photo appear here. Last week, Stuart sent me the article and asked me to title it “Golden Grabs in Tokyo,” which, as you can see, I’ve done. Regarding the title, Stuart wrote this: “This pertains to the fact that it happened during Japan’s “Golden Week” holiday.  I assume you still have the image of all those Blue Note album covers for a Wow factor.” He also sent me a picture of his friend who, he said,  “made off with two Mobleys, 1550 and 1568. You’ll see the 1568 right next to one of your favorites.” So, without further ado, here is the article that Stuart sent me:

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Another mini-adventure in Jazz Collecting

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I have a bunch of things to catch up on, including a mini-adventure in Jazz Collecting from earlier this year. Let’s start with the mini adventure and then do a separate post later on all of the other stuff. Because I’ve been doing the Jazz Collector site for about 20 years, I come up very high on Google searches for anyone looking to do anything with jazz collectibles. Over the years, I’ve gotten some weird and fascinating inquiries. I’ve also been able to buy some collections, such as the one from Irving Kalus back in  2012, 13 years ago, believe it or not. If you’re new to Jazz Collector and never read that story, check it out. It’s a fun read. To give you a little tease, the graphic accompanying this post is from back then. I would say I average one or two inquiries a week, and most of them turn out to be nothing. This latest one turned out to be something, although I’m still not sure what. It started, as they all do, with an email. The subject line read: “Donation of a collection.” Here was the text: “My brother passed away. He had a collection of well over 1,000 Jazz CDs, many unopened. I am not a fan, so I would like to donate the collection to someone who would enjoy it. I’m in White Plains, NY. Please find someone to take it, I would hate to send it to recycling. Thank you.” Read more

The Artificial Intelligence Version of JazzCollector.com

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Have any of you tried ChatGPT for artificial intelligence? I have been using it for a work project, and it’s been a pretty fascinating experience. I can see that the type of work of been doing for the past 16 years, basically writing about the convergence of business and technology, will likely be almost completely taken over by AI within the next few years.  I am using ChatGPT 4, which is the most sophisticated version. I am bringing that up because my system stopped responding for a few minutes this morning, so to get it restarted, I typed in a topic I know quite a bit about: Jazz Collector. I asked two questions: What can you tell me about JazzCollector.com? Who is the main person responsible for JazzCollector.com. The response came back in less than one minute. I thought you might all be interested, below. BTW, the picture accompanying this article has nothing to do with the article. Just thought I’d post a picture of one of my favorite covers, so as not to mess up the format. Anyway, here’s what artificial intelligence has to say about Jazz Collector and me: Read more

Coming to You Live (Sort of): Jazz Collector Radio and Podcasts

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I just got back from taping my seventh Jazz Collector Live radio show in the studio of WTBR-FM in Pittsfield. I’ve really enjoyed doing the show, but I have to admit that it has taken away time that might otherwise have been devoted to posting here at the Jazz Collector web site. Hopefully, I will soon be able to strike a better balance, especially because doing the radio show is getting me more involved with my collection and listening much more attentively. For example, today’s show was devoted to John Coltrane, as a leader, playing standards, on the Prestige label. Soultrane, Settin’ the Pace, Lush Life, et al. Great stuff. Last week, I did Bill Evans as a sideman, and the week before the show was devoted to Thelonious Monk. Sound interesting? Well, the shows are now available to be downloaded as podcasts. Go to this site: WTBRFM.COM. There’s a tab for shows, and under the tab for podcasts you will find the familiar Jazz Collector logo at the very bottom. Read more

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