On eBay: Watching Some Prestiges

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Here are some interesting items we’ll be watching this weekend.

Tommy Flanagan Overseas, Prestige 7134. This is an original pressing. The vinyl is listed in M- and the cover looks to be VG++. I went years and years without ever seeing a copy of this record, always to hear about it in legend as one of the rarest of the rare. It’s funny, isn’t it, how there seems to be a nice copy of this record on eBay every couple of weeks? I think it’s a function of eBay and potential sellers realizing that can get top dollar for the record, so they look to flip it. I don’t have an original copy in my collection, but I’ve survived this long without it, so I think I’ll be OK. This one is more than $1,300 and it still has not reached the seller’s reserve price.

Hank Mobley, Mobley’s Second Message, Prestige 7082. This is an original pressing and it looks to be in VG++ condition for both the record and the cover. This is being offered by Academy LPs in New York. It’ s funny, I went into their

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A Blues Walk & A Visit to A Shrine

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Perhaps CeeDee started a trend this week with his guest column. Here’s another from our friend Don-Lucky:

A ‘Blues Walk’ in NYC…

“Lou Donaldson at the Vanguard on Tuesday April 6th, 2010 was one of the best sets I’ve seen there in a while and well worth the long drive down to NYC from Ottawa. The first set began with Lou’s theme song Blues Walk and escalated through a series of standards and into Alligator Boogaloo from there. He was accompanied by Randy Johnston on guitar, Pat Bianchi on the organ, and Fukushi Tainaka on the drums… It didn’t stop there, Dr. Lonnie Smith dropped in to pay his respects for the second set, along with a quick cameo by Roy Hargrove, and a few vocals by singer Champion Fulton. Definitely worth the trip. Although Lonnie seems to think I owed him money from the last time he was in Canada. Don’t ask me why !

As for the rest of the trip, I did manage to drop in on Rudy Van Gelder at his fabled studio in Englewood Cliffs, N.J.,  on the way out Wednesday morning. That’s the studio in the picture above. Rudy wanted

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On eBay: Dex, Garland, Trane

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I wound up taking a six-week hiatus from selling records on eBay after my mom passed away, but I am back now and have been busy posting records by the armful the past couple of weeks. Some of the items are records I’ve written about on Jazz Collector, so we can see whether my investments were wise or not so wise. Here are a few:

Stan Levey, This Time the Drum’s on Me, Bethlehem 37. This is a record that features some very rare Dexter Gordon from the 1950s. It’s amazing to think how infrequently Dexter was recorded during this period, when you would have expected him to be quite prolific. Anyway, I bought this record in a batch of other records and wrote about it under the title: Taking a Chance on Junk Vinyl. It was among a group of 25 records and the whole batch cost me $30. This is already at $40 on eBay and should sell for a bit more than that.

Red Garland with John Coltrane, High Pressure, Prestige 7209. This was one of the ones I purchased in the

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Sealed Giant Steps? $2,025? Huh?

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I know this is going to give some of you a heart attack: That sealed copy of Giant Steps of unknown provenance sold for $2,025.55. What happens with something like that? Does the buyer even open it? If he does, what if it’s just a standard red and green label? What happens? I think it’s amazing that this seller is able to get these prices for some of his offerings. But I do wonder if there’s an alternate reality going on that we’re not aware of, like whether there is one set of buyers that are completely rapt by his marketing wizardry and only bid on his stuff and are not bidding on any other records. Here are a couple of other auctions we were watching from him: Louis Armstrong at the Crescendo Volume 2, Decca 8169. This is a pretty routine record that you could probably find pretty regularly for $10 or $20 at a weekend record show. This one sold for $103.50. How about: Billie Holiday, Lady in Satin, Columbia 8048? This was a 6-eye stereo pressing. Nothing special, right? This one sold for $157.55. As I was copying the picture of Giant Steps, I took another look at the listing. Someone asked about the label and this was the seller’s reply:

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Guest Column: Making The Case For CDs

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When we started Jazz Collector we invited members of the community to contribute to the site and, if you check out the About page, we apparently still do. To date, no one has really taken us up on the offer and all of the posts have been written by yours truly, which has been fine. The other day, however, we got a note from one of our readers asking if he could post an item and, of course, the answer was yes. So here it is:

“Greetings-my name is Ceedee and I’m a jazz collector. I’ve been using this music and the never-ending search for the next ‘must-have’ as a source of pure pleasure and inspiration for nearly 40 years now. And if the latest list of items I’m watching at eBay is any indication, it’s a search that’s not about to end any time soon. It’s the access to collections and collectors worldwide that eBay has made possible – not to mention great web sites such as Jazz Collector – which go a long way towards enabling this ‘healthy’ habit.

Before the 12-step analogy goes any further, let me assure you that for me, it has been necessary

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On eBay: Lee Morgan, Webster Young, Andy Warhol

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The seller Jazzhound, who is apparently local to me but whom I don’t know, has been selling some nice items on eBay, including: Lee Morgan, The Cooker, Blue Note 1578. This was an original pressing and the vinyl was in M- condition and the cover was VG++ and the price was only $565.33. Did I say only $565.33? Yes I did. It just seems that this record should be selling for more money, even though this is the highest price we’ve ever recorded for the Jazz Collector Price Guide. The same seller has a few more nice rarities selling this week, including: Webster Young, For Lady, Prestige 7106. This is an original pressing with the New York label and it is a fine album, indeed. This copy is in M- condition for both the vinyl and the cover and it is currently at around $500. And this is one that features a cover design by Andy Warhol:

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On eBay: Blue Note, Transition & Hyperbole

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Was watching this later pressing to see if it would sell: John Jenkins with Kenny Burrell, Blue Note 1573. This was a United Artists pressing. The vinyl was in M- condition, but the cover had a corner clip. The starting price was $44.44 and there were no bidders. Not sure where the market is for these United Artists pressings. I do have a bunch of them and I’m planning to hold onto them. They sound fine, not like the original pressings, but not like the reprocessed stereo editions either.

Here’s an interesting one from our “friend” Bobdjukic: Don Byas, Tenor Sax Solos, Atlantic 11233. This is a 10-inch LP with an interesting cover. The listing notes that it is an uncredited David Stone Martin illustration and, I have to admit, it looks like one for sure. But when this seller says something is “absolutely certain” I tend to wonder. In this case, I think he’s accurate, but it would nice to get confirmation from one of the experts out there as well. The rest of the hyperbole in the listing is a true work of art. Here is some of the language: “One of the rarest jazz albums in existence,” plus “We are reasonably certain that less than four copies

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More Vintage Getz

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Posting that clip on Stan Getz playing The Way You Look Tonight evoked something for a bunch of readers last week. I got a note from my friend Dan Axelrod with an interesting story and clip:

“Billy Bauer told me he was in the Royal Roost in the early 50’s and Stan on a break returned to the bandstand and without accompaniment daven’d Little Girl Blue and when he was done there wasn’t a dry eye in the club.This ’56 live  Basin Street Cafe rendition (Shelly Manne, Oscar Pettiford, Dick Katz)  evokes a bit of that beauty- if you wanna post.”

stan-getz-little-girl-blue

A few words of explanation. Dan uses the word “daven’d.” This would be something of a Jewish colloquialism, although I’ve never heard anyone else use it precisely in this context. I think it generally means prayed, but in this case

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Ready for a Risk? How About a Sealed LP

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We’ve been watching a seller this week with some sealed records on the Savoy label. These are a risk, since you can’t tell if the pressing is an original with the red label and the deep groove or perhaps a later pressing with the maroon label. The difference in value between these two pressings could be several hundred dollars — or perhaps even more, depending upon the record. While I’m a risk-taker, some of these got a little too high for my comfort level. Here are a couple:

Introducing Lee Morgan with the Hank Mobley Quintet, Savoy 12091. We’ve seen original copies of this record in nice condition selling for more than $500 in the Jazz Collector Price Guide, so a new, unplayed original would be worth quite a bit. But is this an original? Only the buyer will know if, indeed, the buyer ever opens it. In this case the buyer is spending $161.50 to find out.

This one was also tempting:

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Adventures in Jazz Collecting: The Auction, Part 6

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Now we get to the batch of records that turned out to be the most pleasant surprise of all. There was at one point a group listed as such: Bill Evans, Seven Riverside LPs. There was a picture on the Web site and there was a copy of Waltz for Debby in there and perhaps an original pressing of New Jazz Conceptions as well. Anyway, I was hoping to steal this one, but once the bidding surpassed $400 I realized there was no steal to be had and I had better keep my mouth shut. The package eventually went for $650. Ah, well. However, about 15 minutes later there was another group of LPs, described as such: Bill Evans, Eleven LPs, Eight Verve and Three Riverside. There was no picture or other description. I won this lot at $80, so my total for these 11 records was $93.60. This is a great batch of music, and each record is in

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