I pose these questions in advance of looking at eBay, which I will do in a moment. I’m very curious to hear your opinions. Mine is that this will have to have an impact on the jazz collectibles market – certainly over the short term and perhaps permanently as well. With so many people out of work and suffering around the world, the somewhat arcane and mundane minutia that come to have define our hobby over the years feels trivial, to me at least. Yes, music can be a comfort and joy and diversion, as can the hobby of collecting. But, with the world in the throes of major transformation, you have to wonder if, how and when priorities will change. Or, perhaps they won’t. They didn’t during the last economic crisis, but I fear that one will pale in comparison to what is coming.

OK, I am now on eBay, doing a search of the highest priced jazz records for auction now. It is a common search I do. The first thing I notice is that there are fewer high-quality records for sale, period. Second, on the entire first page of this search there are only two records that have any bids at all. They are a signed copy of a record I never heard of, Machine Gun by the Peter Brotzmann Octet for $540, and a clean black label stereo pressing of Bill Evans Waltz for Debby for about $200. On the next page of 25 listings there is some action for a couple of Blue Notes, including Basra by Pete LaRoca and Speak No Evil by Wayne Shorter.

I do this particular search all the time in writing posts for Jazz Collector and this is about as light as I’ve seen the action. If you’re a buyer this is probably a good time to buy. If you’re a seller, you might be staying away, holding onto inventory and hoping that the market will return to what had been, for years, a sense of normalcy. But, I repeat the questions I asked above in a different framework: Will there be a new normal and has it begun already?