Following up on some of the jazz vinyl auctions we were watching on eBay. Here are a few from the Jazz Record Center auction

Lee Morgan, Candy, Blue Note 1590. Original pressing, M- or VG++ for both the record and the cover. Final price $3,839

Lee Morgan, Indeed!. Blue Note 1538. Original pressing. Probably M- for the record and VG++ for the cover. Starting price at $2,000 and did not sell.

Lee Morgan, City Lights, Blue Note 1575. Deep groove, West 63^rd Street pressing.  Probably M- for both the record and the cover. Final price $1,600.

Lee Morgan Sextet, Blue Note 1541. Lexington Avenue pressing. Probably VG++ for the record and M- for the cover. Looked new in the pictures. Final price $2,682.69.

Lee Morgan, Lee-Way, Blue Note 4034. Original West 63^rd Street pressing, review copy. Probably M- condition for both the record and the cover. May VG++ for the cover, depending upon the anality of the buyer. Final price $1,160.

This is one I was watching that also did not sell: Charlie Parker, For Collectors Only, Alternate Masters, Volume 2, Dial 905. This one looked VG for the record and the cover. Opening bid price was $900 and the buy-it-now price was $1,170. This is another Bird Item I would like to have in my collection. Someday, if the price is right . . .

I had thought about bidding on this when the price was relatively low, but I never would have won it anyway:

Bebop Jazz With All the Stars of the New Movement, Dial D-1. This was a 3-record 78-album, featuring Charlie Parker, Sonny Berman and others. The records and covers were graded at VG. I love these early, clearly authentic, original records from the late 1940s and early 1950s, but at $378 this auction went way beyond what I would typically pay for something like this.

And then there was this: Dexter Gordon, Getting’ Around, Blue Note 4204. This was a sealed copy. The cover was mono “High Fidelity” and it had all the trappings of an original pressing. There was no Liberty mention on the cover, for example. But how would a bidder know? The cost to find out was $229.51, which was the final auction price for this record. Existential question of the day: Will the buyer ever open it to find out or listen to it, or will this record remain pristine and unopened until the end of time, which, given the state of things in the U.S. these days, may be here sooner rather than later?

Well, perhaps there is something in the air. First record I went to on eBay is: Charlie Parker, Bird Blows the Blues, Dial 901. This is an original pressing with the red vinyl. I believe we have established here on Jazz Collector that this was the first 12-inch vinyl record ever? I add the question mark because I’m still not sure. Anyway, I have never owned a copy of this record, and won’t own this one. The starting price is $1,500 and it’s only in VG condition. Even worse, the seller doesn’t include an original picture. That very clear, really enticing picture accompanying the listing, and accompanying this post, is actually copied from a book. For $1,500, I personally wouldn’t mind seeing the real deal, not that I would ever pay $1,500 anyway.

This is another gap in my collection that won’t be filled this week: Hank Mobley and Lee Morgan, Peckin’ Time, Blue Note 1574. This is an original West 63rd Street pressing with the deep grooves, ear, RVG, etc. It is listed in M- condition for both the record and the cover. The price is already approaching $1,300 and, in this condition, I wouldn’t be surprised if this one ends up in the $2,000 bin, if not the $3,000 bin.

Here’s another one destined to fetch a nice price: The Magnificent Thad Jones Volume 3, Blue Note 1546. This is an original New York 23 pressing listed in VG++ condition for the record. The cover is listed as VG, although it looks like that may be a conservative grade. The price is in the $800 range as of this writing and is also destined to go up because there are several days still left before the auction ends.

For some reason my attention today seems to be drifting towards records that I don’t own, but would like to own. So we will close with yet another: Roland Kirk, Triple Threat, King 539. This is an original pressing from 1956. The record is in VG++ condition and the cover is VG or VG+. Man, I would like to own this record. To be honest, I’ve never even heard it. How old was Kirk in 1956? (Checking Google). He was 21. Wow, I should figure out a way to at least listen to this record to hear what he sounded like at that age. As regular readers may recall, he was one of my all-time favorite live performers, totally mesmerizing and extremely underrated on tenor. Anybody out there have a copy of this record and want to share their thoughts?

Gotta go. Ella and Louis just came up on the random playlist.

Hank Mobley, Mobley’s Message, Prestige 7061. This is an original New York yellow label that looks to be in VG++ condition for the record and possibly VG++ for the cover as well. Looks like it is in the original rice paper sleeve, if that means anything to anyone. For me, I love to buy the records in the original rice paper, but then I often change it because I find the paper sleeves more convenient and, for some reason, they feel “safer,” whatever that means. Anyway, this record has a start price of $500 and so far there are no bidders with nearly three days left on the auction.

I hope Don Lucky is keeping an eye on this space because I would value his opinion on this listing from eBay: 7 Early Miles Davis on Dial, 1 signed by Charle Parker. For some reason the seller thinks putting Miles Davis in the headline would be more impressive than putting in Charlie Parker, but that is beside the point. The point is that these are at seven Dial 78s, six with Bird as the leader, and the claim that one of them features a genuine Charlie Parker autograph. In fact, if you look at the “autograph” it is made out “To Jackie,” so those of us with vivid imaginations can imagine Bird giving this to Jackie Mclean and signing it, as this is signed, “To Jackie, Best Wishes, Charlie Yard Bird Parker.” If you knew it was an authentic Bird signature, what would you pay for it? If you knew it was originally made out to Jackie McLean, what would you pay for it? The price on this set is $299 and so far there are no bidders. I hate buying 78s on eBay because they are so vulnerable to breakage during shipping, but I am, to say the least, quite intrigued by this listing. I’ll be keeping an eye on it.

I had now been through the 78s and the last element was to go through the remainder of the LPs that I had left in the original Home Depot boxes. There was a lot of junk in there, and I immediately stuffed a bunch of records into a couple of boxes to donate. But there were also a lot of nice records, not necessarily high-end collectibles of the caliber that I had brought into my apartment, but some great music, great records and many still in their original loose plastic sleeves. There were Cannonball Adderleys on Riverside, Milt Jacksons on Savoy, Miles Davis on Columbia and even a couple of Blue Notes I had somehow missed, including Horace Silver’s Cape Verdean Blues.

At this point, I still hadn’t listened to any of the records. I was up in the country. I pulled out an old favorite to break in the collection, My Favorite Things by John Coltrane. Then Kind of Blue. I did sort of the same thing when I got back to New York and starting playing those records. I started with Tenor Madness, a beautiful New York original pressing, not a mark on it. Then I went to Blue Train, an original pressing, one side New York 23, one side West 63^rd. Absolutely mint, save for the date written on the back by Uncle Bruce, 1-31-58. As of this writing I still haven’t listened to Tommy Flanagan Overseas, or Jackie’s Pal, or Jutta Hipp With Zoot Sims, or Informal Jazz or most of the better collectibles, which are still sitting in crates in the apartment. I plan to go through these records slowly, listening to them one at a time through the winter and into the spring, if I can hold out.

I am near the end of the story of this collection, save for one last element. I would like to know more about Uncle Bruce and the history of the collection itself. Rob was a young child when Uncle Bruce died, so he didn’t have much to share. I could see that Uncle Bruce lived in Milwaukee for a good portion of the time he was buying these records. Some of them had stickers that said:

Radio Doctors: Two Stores
213 W. Wells St. – BR. 6-6422
404 N. Third St. – LO.2-7607
Milwaukee, Wisc.

He then moved to Southern California, because the later records had stickers and stamps from a record store in Compton. In a follow-up e-mail, Rob said that his uncle was named Bruce M. West and he confirmed that he lived in both Milwaukee and Los Angeles. He said he had given my information to his brother and sister and he was hoping that they would reach out to me to share more information about Bruce. If I hear from them, I will write an epilogue to this story.

In the meantime, I think I will always feel some kind of connection to Uncle Bruce in the passion we shared for this great music and also, of course, for the records themselves. He didn’t have the largest collection, but he had some of the most precious and rare records of the era and I am proud to now own them. He obviously cared for these records and kept them in beautiful condition, treating them like the gems that they are. I plan to do the same.

And every time I pull one off the shelf and pull it out of its jacket, I will see the writing with the date on the back, knowing that Bruce M. West had purchased that record on that date, had kept it in its original packaging and had preserved it well, so that when I came upon this very record it would be like new and I could enjoy it with the same love and appreciation that he did 50 or more years ago. And, hopefully, 50 years from now, someone will look at that very same record, with that date carefully written on the back, and put the music on a turntable and feel the same joy and excitement that Bruce and I felt in the time of our lives.

I always liked this record, but haven’t listened to in in a while: Zoot Sims in Paris, United Artists 14013. This was an original pressing with the grey labels and was probably in VG+ condition for the record and VG++ for the cover. It sold for $202.51.

Here’s an update on some 10-inch jazz vinyl:

Clifford Brown, New Star on the Horizon, Blue Note 5032. This was an original Lexington Avenue pressing in VG++ condition for the record and VG+ for the cover. It sold for $349.

Dexter Gordon Quintet, Dial 204. This was an original 10-inch pressing in VG++/M- condition for the record and M- for the cover. It sold for $355.

Horace Silver Trio/Art Blakey with Sabu, Blue Note 5034. This was an original 10-inch pressing in M- condition for both the record and the cover. The asking price was about $250 and, surprisingly, there were no bidders. I imagine we will see this back again soon.

This is another nice one that is also lacking bids at the moment: Sonny Rollins, Way Out West, Contemporary 3530. this is an original promo copy in M- condition for both the cover and the record. Looks like a real gem, also with nice pictures from the seller. There is a start price of about $500 and a buy-it-now price of about $700. If any copy of Way Out West would set a new price high, this would seem to be it, an original promo in M- condition. But the start price is up there. In the Jazz Collector Price Guide we’ve never recorded a copy of this record selling for more than $300.

One more:

John Coltrane, Giant Steps, Atlantic 1311. This is an original black label pressing that looks to be in M- condition for both the record and the cover. Another beauty. This one will sell. The bidding has just about reached $600 and there’s still more than a day to go.

This is one that’s new to me, but it got a huge price: Rosemary Squires, My Love is a Wanderer, MGM 3597. Looks like this one was in M- condition for the record an the cover, other than a cutout hole on the cover. Rosemary Squires was a British pop star, and I’m not quite sure what makes this record so valuable and so desired by collectors, that they would drive the price all the way up to $1,580.55. I’m sure someone out there will be happy to enlighten me.

Here’s another for the $1,000 bin:

Art Pepper, Modern Art, Intro 606. This was an original pressing. The seller described the record and cover as being in very good condition, but it seems she was describing them rather than grading them. In reading the entire listing, including the questions, one might assume that the condition was actually closer to VG++ or even better. At least that may explain the price: $1,525, which would not be a likely price if bidders believed the record was just VG.

I was keeping on eye on this record on eBay: Charlie Parker, Dial 202. It struck me that there are few of the Bird records that have the same cachet as collectibles, and perhaps even as music, as they did when I started getting into jazz 4o or so years ago. At that time, Bird was, well, Bird, and there was nobody more important. Finding an original Bird Savoy or an original Bird Mercury or Clef was a nice score. Not so much anymore. Anyway, this particular record, a 10-incher, has been bid up to more than $150, so somewhere there is still strong interest, which, to me, is a good thing.

From the same seller is Hank Mobley, Mobley’s Message, Prestige 7061. This is another one I once owned and now regret selling. This one looks to be in VG condition, perhaps VG+, but probably VG. It is about $120 with a few days left to go.

If it’s “insanely rare” it must be the seller bobjdukic, who is back with a bunch of records, including:

Moondog, The Story of Moondog, Prestige 7099. This looks to be an original pressing. The record is described as M- and the cover as VG++, but the picture on the cover shows that it is VG+ at best, with a water stain. That should impact the price, which is about $100 with a few days left. There is also a reserve price that has not yet been met. The cover, designed by Andy Warhol, is the reason this one is valued so highly as a collectible.