The Inbox: Junior Mance Documentary, Expensive Vinyl
Here are a few items from our email inbox, starting with a note from a producer of a planned documentary about the pianist Junior Mance. It seems a lot of the film’s focus will be on Mance’s relationship with his wife Gloria, his career and his battle with dementia. I took a look at the trailer and it definitely seems a worthwhile project. In addition to posting this comment, I made a contribution to the Kickstarter campaign to support the movie. I first became aware of Mance on his early albums as a sideman with Cannonball Adderley and Johnny Griffin/Lockjaw Davis. He always had a big soulful sound, somewhat underrated as both a soloist and as a sideman, IMHO. It would be nice to see a documentary tribute to his life and work. Speaking of which, I am hoping to see the Lee Morgan documentary this weekend and I’ll have an update soon on the Coltrane documentary “Chasing Trane” next week since the movie is opening soon in New York.
Regular commentator dottorjazz from Italy sent me the following link: Miles Davis, The Complete 1963-1964 Columbia Recordings, Mosaic MQ10-226. This was a 10-LP boxed set in mint condition. It sold for $1,045 and perhaps dottorjazz sent it to me because we haven’t seen many Mosaics in the $1,000 bin. Perhaps the full three-boxes of the Commodore series, but not a single box set, at least not that I can recall.
Another reader sent me a link to this record: Tubby Hayes and the Jazz Couriers Featuring Ronnie Scott, Tempo TAP 15. This was an original pressing listed in Ex condition for both the record and the cover. It sold for $2,252.78
I’ve bought a few things from the seller audio_grail and they’ve all been in superb condition, so I’m sure that Tubby Hayes was quite nice… surviving on a reissue of that one myself.
Audio-Grail advertises in the want ads in my local newspaper for hi-fi equipment (high end only) and record collections. I was a bit surprised as they’re based hundreds of miles away from me.
I think I paid about 1/20 of that for a decent copy of the Tubby/Ronnie.
My copy of the Mosaic box is #695/3000. I bought it when new at $180 plus shipping from Mosaic. Most copies have sold on eBay in the $3-400 range, which i suspect is “reasonable”. A bid of $1000 is way too much. By the way, I’m not selling mine even though I’ve got many of the originals.
get behind the Mance film people…
I will! That film looks great. Shared on FB as well.