The record changer (Jan-Dec 1953)

8 i RECORDS WANTED I AM INTERESTED IN IUYING OUTRIGHT small or large collections of Jazz, Sweet, Swing, Personality, Blues, Bop, or Pops. I wlff pay spot cash for such collections. If you have a collection you wish to dispose of, please write, giving full details of the collection, type, artists included, labels, and most important of all please describe the condition of the records carefully. Then set your lowest price for the lot. I do not buy piecemeal but will take all or none. It is important that you set the price because I do not have time for long correspondence or haggling. If the price looks right ang the collection is large enough I will travel to your town to inspect the records and close the deal. If you are on the west coast I have an agent there who will contact you. I am also interested in acquiring dealers' stocks from before 1940 and after 1924. WRITE, WIRE, OR PHONE BILL GRAUER. Jr. 125 LA SALLE STREET, NEW YORK 27. N. Y. behind the cobwebs (Continued from Page 6) group as on Perfect is Keep Your Temper/ Santa Claus Blues, recorded Nov. 5, 1925, and issued on Co 14107. Regarding the Wabash Trio coupling of Coal Black Blues/Lone Western Blues on Grey Gull which we also mentioned in the same column, John says he believes we can discount Ed Allen and Clarence Williams definitely; but it does come close to King Oliver, James P. Johnson, and Lonnie Johnson. He personally says "neither Oliver nor James P. could be present, judged solely by my own listening, for what it's worth. It remains a mystery as far as I am concerned." Further comment invited — and what about the St. Louis Blues side we discussed in connection with the Wabash Trio sides? Label of the Month: In February we used Nadsco as our subject and promised a tie-in for March. We didn't 'have room to run it however, so here it is this month. The label is Amco, another member of the Grey Gull gang. Our specimen is Amco 1279 and the side shown is When Someone Steals Your Sweetie Away (3623 A) as by the Big City Six while the reverse is Joanna (3614A) as by the International Dance Orchestra. The label is brown with all lettering and lines in gold. But the reason for mentioning February's entry is the interesting speculation as to whether Amco was ever pressed as such! This one was obviously a pasted on label and so we peeled off one side to see what was underneath. And we found that the pressing, • before Amco labels were pasted on, was none other than Nadsco 1279! All details (band name, cat. no., title, composer credits) were identical on both labels. The reason for the alteration job would be interesting to know and the question is were any Amcos ever pressed? And are they all pasted on Nadsco? So let's have reports on any Amco couplings you have or see. Back to John H. Baker once more. Mr. Baker has started a piano roll collection and he is interested in knowing if a publication, such as the Record Changer, dealing with articles, information, and exchange ads on player piano rolls, exists. Does anyone know of such a publication? Space is gone again. Benny Goodman collectors— Write us for important news! Send your data, queries, comments, information, etc., to us at 74 South Road, Harrison, New York, or c/o the Record Changer. See you next month. mcandrew In the Torrid Thirties, along came Eddy Duchin and retarded the progress of the popular piano solo a few decades with his heavy, humorless mechanics, including the one-finger idea — which quickly began to rival the drop of water on the forehead for unrelieved torture. After Duchin had embalmed some of our most undeserving songs, to the unaccountable relish of millions, along came Carmen Cavallaro, Joe Reichman, Nat Brandwynne, Ted Straeter and many others, all hewing as closely as possible to the formula that has prevailed, practically without relief, for the last twenty years, so that a spinning of any one of the discs already mentioned now seems like a breath of fresh air. In the mid-thirties, they also began gilding the lily by adding bass and drums and accessories that only served to stifle any originality the pianist might have. This lamentable encumbrance was extended to the hot piano, where it did incalculably more damage, since all of the jazz pianists ceased their improvising of the whole and instead simply played pretty nothings around the beat note struck by the bassist. Occasionally, such a group will integrate well enough for the pianist to emerge as the soloist he was intended to be, such as on the Art Tatum Trio sides, originally on 12" Comet and now on LP Dial, and featuring The Man I Love, Body and Soul. I Know That You Know, Flying Home, and others. This also applies to most of the Johnny Guarnieri solos, now available on Royale and Varsity EP and LP, some of which are true solos, i.e., Exactly Like You, Mean to Me, More Than You Know, Tiger Rag. Otherwise, the only piano solos with the stamp of the individual are the very, very few that now are made by the pianist alone. You can get a representative James P. Johnson group on Decca LP 5190 on which he goes to town in eight of his most famous compositions including Old Fashioned Love, If I Could Be With You, Porter's Love Song; Art Tatum on Capitol H-269, on which he performs, of others, Sweet Lorraine, Time On My Hands, Somebody Loves Me, Talk Of The Town, although all are strangely lackadaisical and flowery; the Ralph Sutton Waller series on Columbia, although they are just what you'd expect imitation Waller to be; Rudolf Friml, doing eight of his rich operetta tapestries with fine flair; and on a standout Blue Note LP Errol Garner redeems himself on tenminute improvisations of Yesterdays and / Got Rhvthm, after too many "with accompaniment" pressings on probably more labels than any other pianist ever covered, and nearly all of them indistinguishable from each other. And Columbia has had the unexpectedly good taste to give Lee Wiley, Stan Freeman and Cy Walter instead of a topheavy Percy Faith or Paul Weston background, making her LP's of Vincent Youmans and Irving Berlin songs wholly delightful.