Win a Free Collectible: Red Rodney Plays Bird
Time to give away another free jazz collectible (that’s free as in no cost, not free as in no chord changes). There was some discussion on the site last week in reference to a sealed copy of Bill Evans’ Waltz For Debby, which sold for more than $2,000. We posed the question: What do you do with a sealed record? Do you open it and play it, thereby violating the seal, or do you just collect it and look at it? Anyway, we were perusing through our records and came upon a few items that were still sealed and decided to use one of these for our next giveaway contest. The item we chose is: Red Rodney, Bird Lives, Muse 5371. This is a 1989 pressing of a 1973 recording and it features Charles McPherson, Barry Harris, Sam Jones and Roy Brooks. The record featuresa bunch of tunes associated with Charlie Parker: Big Foot, I’ll Remember April, Donna Lee, Chasing the Bird, ‘Round Midnight and 52nd Street Theme. It is a nice, swinging bop record and it’s still in its original factory seal, 20 years after its issue. As always, the purpose of these giveaways is to encourage people to comment on the Jazz Collector site. So, this contest will last two weeks. To be eligible to win this record, all you have to do is comment somewhere on the site during the next two weeks. At the end of the day on Monday, July 27, the names of everyone who has commented will be placed in a hat and the winner will be chosen by the lovely Mrs. Jazz Collector. We will ship the record, free, to the winner, anywhere in the world, and we will even pay for the postage. Pretty good deal, right? So please feel free to comment on this post or any other post and we will be happy to make you eligible for the contest.
A sealed record has to remain sealed, especially if you paid it heavy $$. Many reasons : if you deseal it and moreover you play it : by doing so, you will be the one who alterate the value of the record, after having been the craziest bidder for a sealed record… nonsense. Another reason is you do not want to realize that it is in not NM at all ; or it is not an original. In other words, you buy a sealed record not to open it, but because you imagine what is inside. And this has no price…
If you are a dealer, yes, you leave it sealed. If you are a music lover, you’re buying a sealed copy because it’s nearly guaranteed to play perfectly, and you want to enjoy the music it contains in as pristine a state as possible. You are paying the extra for that perfect first play.
The idea of paying $2000 for any record is confusing enough, but as a commodity, like any other, I suppose trading in it as an investment has some merit. As to opening a sealed $2000 record and playing it for a supposed “perfect first play”, that’s smells to me like vintage wine… a bit bourgeois for jazz isn’t it?
This is a recording that deserves to be heard. Red
made some great sides for Muse and very little of
this work has made it to CD.