Comments on: Prestiges and Transitions and Booklets and Speculation

By: JOK

JOK — Mon, 23 May 2022 21:10:30 +0000

I see where Art Pepper on Intro sold for $1,718. (Carolina Soul auction).

By: Clifford Allen

Clifford Allen — Mon, 23 May 2022 17:34:40 +0000

I think the empty playground reference is a kind of memento mori — especially as Brownie and Wardell’s lives were both tragically cut short. I like the design myself.

By: Mark Hall

Mark Hall — Sun, 22 May 2022 07:52:54 +0000

Carolinasoul has over 1000 records listed wow! not to mention some pretty heave hitter Blue notes, most are in vg/vg+ condition ,i assume a lot of those are on co-signment? anyway he is going to be busy mailing all those records

By: Jay Fulmer

Jay Fulmer — Sat, 21 May 2022 16:39:37 +0000

I dunno Rudolf, the empty playground theme for Wardell and Clifford is a striking visual statement, no matter what motivated the marketing strategy

By: Rudolf

Rudolf — Sat, 21 May 2022 11:59:37 +0000

The similarity of the children’s playground design on the Clifford Brown and Wardell Gray Memorials is striking. Still, for a memorial album the playground design is an absolute misser, at least for me.
Bob Weinstock was thinking in terms of sales. When the Elmo Hope Sextet, Informal Jazz, 7043 was lagging behind, it was renamed Two Tenors, the brown sleeve with Hank Mobley the first tenor. He changed again to cash in on Trane ‘s success, and it became almost Trane ‘s album. The liners of the 2nd and 3rd versions are identical, reference to Elmo deleted.
Another Hope album which was repackaged is 7021. From a Hope album it became a Frank Foster album. The second design by an unknown artist (Reid Miles?) is really nice. Conclusion: Hope did not sell. His trio recording 7010 was quickly deleted.
The first design of 7013, Conception, is not attractive, the second by Reid Miles is.
The subject is Interesting. Many more interesting examples.
E.g. The Jon Eardly Septette, 7033, with the nice Gil Mellé made design, became Down East, a freight train, with Phil Woods and Zoot Sims the leaders. The liners have been adapted and Jon’s role deleted.

By: Clifford Allen

Clifford Allen — Fri, 20 May 2022 23:11:00 +0000

I gather that the Wardell cover was done to capitalize on a similar design for the Clifford Brown Memorial and get people to potentially buy both, especially if the former wasn’t selling too well.

By: japhy

japhy — Fri, 20 May 2022 14:42:45 +0000

That Melle has always been one of my favorite covers. Wish I had a copy!

By: Al

Al — Fri, 20 May 2022 12:56:27 +0000

Yes, I’ve seen that cutout hole on a lot of Riversides. Actually, the hole often goes right through the record when they do it in that spot.

By: Jay Fulmer

Jay Fulmer — Fri, 20 May 2022 12:44:36 +0000

It is a drill hole, as can be seen in the pics, the drill goes right through the record label. This wasn’t an uncommon practice back then.

By: James Haug

James Haug — Fri, 20 May 2022 12:31:42 +0000

You’re right, the cut-out hole is odd, even brutal, but not uncommon. I have a few Riversides with this same bullet hole, including a Bill Evans and a first-press stereo Incredible Guitar of Wes Montgomery.

I’ve also wondered about the Prestige quick-change covers. In the case of Sonny Rollins Plus Four, the 2nd cover is a Reid Miles design, and pretty nice. Was Prestige attempting to ride coattails on Blue Note’s success with Mr Miles?