Category: Features

A New Adventure in Jazz Collecting, Part 4

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The pix with these posts are copies of some of the records to be auctioned. The real pics will be with the listings.

Looking back, it seems I’ve been going through this existential angst about what to do with my collection ever since I started Jazz Collector back in 2003, and probably well before that. I am sure, among this audience, I am not alone, but I’m fairly unique in that I  have this forum to share and explore my experiences, as I am doing yet again. I learn a lot about myself from doing Jazz Collector and from paying attention to the comments on the site.

In this case, I go back to a post I did on June 20, 2022 titled Back in Action. This was another one of those angsty posts in which I shared that my long-term plan for retirement was to spend more time doing Jazz Collector and to go back to selling records on eBay, a la Rudolf and some of the other regular contributors to the site. There were a lot of thoughtful comments on that post but one especially hit a nerve. It was from Mark and this is what he said:

“I think the last thing I would want to do when I retire is sell jazz records online! I mean perhaps selling a few key high end pieces would make sense, but in reality I would rather just consign the whole collection to a big name eBay dealer or store. It also seems that collecting taxes and such is more and more of a thing these days on Discogs and eBay.” Read more

A New Adventure in Jazz Collecting, Part 3

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The pix with these posts are copies of some of the records to be auctioned. The real pics will be with the listings.

I trace the roots of this latest chapter in The Great Jazz Vinyl Countdown back to a post I wrote on Jazz Collector on July 28, 2022. It was simply called Updates. In this midst of writing about a bunch of records on eBay, I went off topic based on a comment from our friend Maarten Kools — the idea of spending time with the records and enjoying them while also enjoying the process of thinning them out. Then, I wrote this: “If someone would have the wherewithal to buy one of the world’s greatest jazz collections in one shot, you know where to find me.”

The next day I received an email. The sender said he did, indeed, have the wherewithal to buy a collection like mine. Henceforth, I will refer to this individual as KC Ken, short for Kansas City Ken, which is neither his real name nor real location. Anyway, I checked him out on LinkedIn and it didn’t take more than a minute to determine that yes, he did have that kind of wherewithal. I wrote back and suggested we chat. Read more

A New Adventure in Jazz Collecting, Part 2

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The pix with these posts are copies of some of the records to be auctioned. The real pics will be with the listings.

Let me start this new adventure with a post from Jazz Collector from Sept. 29, 2009. I had the audacity to call it The Great Jazz Vinyl Countdown, and this an abridged version of how it began:

“I counted my records the other day. At least I counted most of them. I have more records than I want. I have them in four separate rooms in two separate homes. I have records I have owned for more than 25 years and have never put on a turntable. I have records by artists I don’t especially like. I have collected them because I am a collector. It’s what I do. That is why my site is called Jazz Collector.

“I counted the records because I have made a fairly momentous decision, and that decision is this: I am going to get rid of many of them. This is heresy, is it not? These are my friends, all hand selected personally by me. I have invited them into my home, to share my space, to give me comfort and joy in times of stress or sorrow. And they have served me well, all of them, in whatever way they could. But the time has come to part with many of them.”

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A New Adventure in Jazz Collecting

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Sometime over the next few weeks the seller Carolina Soul Records will be running an eBay auction that will include many really, really nice original jazz collectibles. These will include a beautiful copy of Jutta Hipp With Zoot Sims, Blue Note 1530, along with nice copies of the other 12-inch Jutta Hipp Blue Notes; a really nice original New York pressing of Sonny Rollins Saxophone Colossus, as well as Blue Note 1542, 1558 and 1581; a West 63rd copy of John Coltrane, Blue Train, Blue Note 1557, plus more than a dozen additional original Tranes; a bunch of Miles originals; Donald Byrd Blows Beacon Hill on Transition, Kenny Dorham Blue Note, Lou Donaldson Blue Note. I could go on.

How do I know so much about this upcoming auction? Read more

What Really Went on in the Van Gelder Studio?

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Speaking of playing favorites, the other night I had a little time to do some mindful listening, so I put on one of my all-timers, Sonny Rollins Plus Four, Prestige 7038, original pressing, original cover, as seen in the accompanying photo. As I’m listening, I’m picturing the musicians in Van Gelder’s studio playing live, looking at one another and giving signals and approvals, all young men in their primes discovering what they were capable of doing and, on this album, doing it as well as anyone ever did it. Then I put on a record I haven’t listened to nearly as often as Sonny Rollins Plus Four, which was Newk’s Time, Blue Note 4001, and I had the same picture in my head with the four musicians on that album, Sonny, Wynton Kelly, Doug Watkins and Philly Joe Jones. And then my mind started wandering and this is what I thought. Read more

Jazz Holiday Bonus

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We have our friend Japhy to thank for today’s post. My inbox contained the following note under the subject “Jazz Collector Website – Jazz Holiday Playlist.”

Hi Al,A decade or so ago I went on a mission to create the ultimate Jazz Christmas (or Holiday, if you prefer) collection. I dug deep, scoured the darkest recesses of the internet, searched every conceivable keyword on iTunes, etc., and ended up with an 8-CD collection (the days of CD burning!) that I called “Yule Be Swinging”.A few years ago I recreated the collection on Spotify (some tunes weren’t available, and some come and go) as a 10-hour, 152-song playlist. They’re all my personal selections, of course, instrumental and vocal, and I tried to stick to “classic Jazz”. There are certainly countless tunes not represented (e.g., I didn’t just dump the entire Ramsey Lewis record on there), and I tried to avoid having 10 versions of any one song, for example (“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” came close!). Point being, anyone can certainly say, “Man! How can you not have Song X on here?!” And that’s fine; this is just were I landed. That said, I’m always looking for any I missed, obscurities in particular. Read more

Back in Action

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Allow me to explain, yet again, why I have taken so long between posts. The reason is related to my real work, but if you stick with me, you will find that it may have relevance for Jazz Collector. My work primarily involves writing about the intersection of business and technology. It’s kind of mercenary, writing-for-hire, but I like doing it, I have nice relationships with many of my clients and I have a wonderful, amazing business partner who is also a good friend. We are negotiating a new deal with our largest client and it’s not yet clear whether we will be able to come to terms. This process has been draining and takes up a lot of my brainpower, or at least whatever is left of it. I haven’t had time to devote to my other passions, of which Jazz Collector is near the top of the list. I haven’t even looked at eBay since my last post on May 31. How is this relevant for Jazz Collector? Read more

Clap Hands, Here Comes Vinyl!

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Someone asked me the other day about listening to vinyl versus other formats. I said, whenever I want to listen to music and be completely mindful and do nothing else, then I will only listen to vinyl. I will pay careful attention, I will listen for nuances that I may have never heard before. This happened the other night. I was sitting with The Lovely Mrs. JC and she said, why don’t you put on a record. Now, in my house, the statement “why don’t you put on a record” is not a simple task, at least when the statement is sent in my direction. There are, after all, 8,000 or so records from which to choose. Which is the right record for the moment? Is it an old reliable favorite? Is it an old favorite I haven’t listened to in years? Is it something I have perhaps never listened to at all because there are for more of those among the 8,000 than I would care to acknowledge? In this particular moment, the situation was complicated by the fact that the record also had to appeal to The Lovely Mrs. JC, since it was she who was making the request. I asked, jazz, jazz vocal, something else? Jazz vocal was the answer. I went into the other room and came back with two records, both old reliable favorites that are certainly among the top 10 jazz vocal records that I have listened to in my lifetime. They were: Read more

A Treasure Trove of LPs, Autographs, Photos and Other Memorabilia from Ornette, Monk and More

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Some of you may remember Dee Dee, Ornette Coleman’s stepdaughter and accomplished jazz photographer. For those who don’t remember, or are new to Jazz Collector, or who just want a refresher, you can go back to the original four-part series of articles, which started on February 21, 2020 (Another Adventure, Part 1: Ornette, Monk, Dee and Me). Dee reached out recently and asked me to post the following note. For what it’s worth, I’ve seen many of Dee’s photographs and they are pretty special. As you will see in Dee’s post, there are also Monk albums, Latin and Brazilian records and other memorabilia that may be of interest to the Jazz Collector community. Here’s Dee:

These remaining Thelonious Monk albums are from his close friend Ornette Coleman’s personal collection. I’m Ornette’s step-daughter, Dee Dee – and retrieved them when my mother died in 1995. They lived together – (with me, early on!) – going back to his earliest 1959 arrival in NYC, in a close relationship spanning 30 years.

She had quite a history in this music, not the least of which was booking (including the Five Spot Café and Town Hall gigs), publicity/promotion for both Monk and Ornette, and international publishing contracts for their compositions, which still generate royalties for the Monk family.

I’ve uncovered documentation, personal letters and original sheet music in his handwriting, a music stand, metronome, a fat scrapbook of clippings from 1959 forward . . . and so much more.

It’s now urgently the time to find a home for the historic value it all contains. Some is being donated to Jazz Foundation of America for their good work, but if anyone has serious interest in knowing more, please contact me immediately:

dee@creativemusicphotography.com

The entire collection is currently in Vermont, but other arrangements are possible.

Jazz LPs and Memorabilia

Additionally, I’ve worked documenting historic jazz, Brazilian, and Latin musicians since 1964 as a formally trained (Herb Snitzer) art photographer.

I have an AUTOGRAPHED Edition of one original silver gelatin print available here:

Autographed Edition – Images, Prices, and Exposure Data

My personal vinyl collection of historic Brazilian and Afro-Cuban/Latin albums can be viewed here – with some accompanying images:

Latin & Brazilian Record Collection

Who Did You See?

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Dexter Gordon in the ’70s. When he played the Vanguard, I would go every night.

This will be fun (for me, at least). It’s a new thing: Who Did I See? And the flip side: Who Did I Not See? I’m 68, born in 1953. I got into jazz at age 17 in 1970. I’ve told that story: Song for My Father. I was born too late to have seen Bird or Fats or Clifford or Pres or Billie or Art Tatum. I grew up in New York and have spent most of my life in New York. When I was a kid, my dad used to drag us to afternoon jazz shows in Manhattan. There was an organization called Jazz Interactions and they used to do Sunday concerts at the Village Gate and other venues. I remember going to the Five Spot on St. Marks as a kid. So I have two lists of Who Did I See. One is Who Did I See before I had any appreciation for who I was seeing. The second list is Who Did I See after I got into jazz and was making my own decisions and spending my own money. BTW, this is jazz only. I did see Cream and I did not see Hendrix, but that’s another list and another web site. These lists are not complete. I don’t remember every drummer or bass player or pianist. I don’t remember everyone I saw. It’s just a list of highlights off the top of my head. The nice thing about Jazz Collector is I can add to, subtract from or amend in my own time and at my own discretion. Here goes: Read more