Most of the music recorded at other parts of the world during the same time period sound like they were recorded with a potato, so I think what RVG did back then is amazing.
I think that Blue Note being run on a shoestring when it was an independent (pre-Liberty buying it in '66) is pretty well established, even if actual business records are largely nonexistent. As for the buying demographic, I think all we have is anecdotal evidence, and I haven't seen many primary sources there.
thanks for the reply... i guess the reason i originally asked was that i'd thought i'd seen some evidence of multiple takes of recordings.. and if you go onto jazzdisco.org you can see that this is sometimes the case .. not sure where they got their info though for instance Hank Mobley Discography shows that there were multiple takes on the tunes that were released on Hank Mobley - Workout
I think another aspect is that vinyl is a finicky medium. So when some of these imperfections are heard (especially for the first time) its often natural to wonder where they originate. Is it my cart mistracking? Is this from the current release? or Is it the tape and no matter what release or expertly set up cart you have its there. In other words, I don't see folks really getting upset as much as discussing the flaws with others to alleviate the curiosity of should I get a new copy, a new cart or just achieve comfy acceptance.
Meanwhile, Back in Newly Disc Hovering Jazz Wonder Land: After finding this thread--and for a long time feeling like I needed to get some more Jazz records into my life and collection--I took the plunge this past month and bought my first threee Tone Poets Reissues, all blindly bought a week a part (and, oddly, all from 1967-8), made by artists I did not have any records of and, in most cases, had not even heard of; so, I got: Bobby Hurcherson ~ Oblique (Blue Note ST-31963) 1967, NJ Duke Pearson ~ The Phantom (Blue Note BST 84293) 1968, NJ Chick Corea ~ Now He Sings, Now He Sobs (Solid State SS18039) 1968, NYC The Bobby I bought based on recommendations inquired about up-thread. First few spins, I liked it but it was a little ¨Vibes-Intense¨ oddly ironically. I learned I like mellower, less busy Jazz, the chiller stuff. But, I will quite rightly give this one many more spins to see if I can see thru this Opaque Oblique and get what I have not got yet. And my son came home for the weekend (him a big Rap and Motown fan, and likes Reggae and learning his Jazz as well) and I put it on for him and he loved it, and must have spun both sides at least 3 times each that weekend. He could not get enough of it. The Duke I bought (honestly) because of the cover; What a Gorgeous Beauty! No idea what was inside. Boy did She please! I LOVE this record. My new favorite Jazz record, or at least tied with my last fave classic Jazz discover key... Bobby is much mellower in this context, and I love Jerry Dodgion´s flute on this record. Dukeś piano is no slouch either!!! The Phantom has a great ensemble cast of very talented players who really seem to coalesce well into just my Cup of Jazz Tea. I hope to wear this record out!! Chick´s pick I bought because he has recently shed his mortal coil and I like to do that when a master musician passes, to check them/out and/or re/knew an old acquaintance, in their honor, and no disrespect intended. First spin, Iĺl admit, I felt it too busy too, but a few spins in I´m starting to hear what he was trying to convey in his unique way. My first favorite song on this record is the title track: ¨Now He Sings, Now He Sobs¨...And now we sob that he can no longer sing and play for us. Thanks for sharing Mr. Corea! So glad I bought these Lps and found this thread and these leads into this Wonder Full World of Jazz; Tone Poets leading the way and so many great options today!
There certainly were multiple takes and sometimes performances were spliced together to get what was on the record, although that was more common at Prestige. but generally albums were cut in a day (with a day's paid rehearsal at Blue Note, no paid rehearsal at Prestige), so there wasn't time for 'endless' retakes. Rarely two days would be devoted to an album. Once in awhile they got two albums done in a day. But things were done quickly and mixing was done on the fly. Really good hi-fi setups were expensive and rare in this era, RVG and other engineers took that into account. I think the statement by another poster upthread is essentially right, just maybe a little exaggerated/simple.
On the demographics? Without crossing the political line let's just say race relations were extremely fraught. Jazz didn't have much mainstream crossover appeal with White's, until albums like Time Out, KOB, and SATVV. Do I have actual sales records? No. But by and large Blue Note was a small label and certainly not moving millions of units. RVG's studio was in his house for goodness sakes.
Jazz was extremely popular during the twentieth century. There were dozens if not hundreds of successful white jazz musicians, from Paul Whiteman and the ODJB on down. Black jazz musicians played in fancy Manhattan clubs for white audiences and then headed uptown for late-night jazz sessions in Harlem clubs. Unless you have an actual citation for this assertion, I'm going to have to call BS.
RVG and BN made deliberate mastering decisions so the LP would be playable on the majority of record players of the time. Steep roll off below abt 60hz, and above about 12khz, with levels pushed to the point of saturation. The original tapes do contain wide band content. The Ampex deck used by RVG was capable of flat response from about 25hz-18/20kz at 15ips. That is why most BN reissues uncover additional bass and HF content, while also seeming to be at a lower volume.
With regard demographics, for what it's worth I used to know a lot of people who made regular record buying trips to the States, some of them specifically looking for Blue Notes, they mostly got them from black sellers and in inner city black neighbourhoods, now they likely missed a lot of white owned collections in New York and Los Angeles/California due to the way they searched and bought, but it confirms that a large part of the original US audience was black. In my experience the UK market at the time was likely 90% white and male though the 10% black and male collections can be slightly more leftfield, Blue Notes were really expensive in the UK during the late fifties and early sixties which will also be reflected in who bought them.
Yes, upper class Whites for entertainment. I guarantee you some farmer or factory worker is not putting on Blue Trane in their spare time.
If you want to go back to the music of the twenties and thirties read the stories of later record collectors such as Ahmet Ertegun, they targeted black neighbourhoods for old Jazz 78s.
Well Splayed Ser! A left hook leaves The Boxer wrapped around the rails! Who needs Sports on theTelly when you got Ringside SHTV!
How did Dave Brubeck end up on the cover Time Magazine in 1954 ? Jazz was extremely popular in the early-mid 50s among white suburbanites and college students.
There were fads where certain Jazz musicians were popular with a mainstream white audience; Brubeck, Mulligan, Ella, Ellington, Armstrong, etc., but hard bop and later soul jazz which were what Blue Note marketed were much more underground with a less white audience. I'm not saying there weren't lots of white Jazz fans, into Blue Note and Prestige, but they had a large black audience who likely didn't buy much Brubeck, a very different market.
Supposedly Time Out was the first jazz album to sell a million copies. Outside of albums from Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, and John Coltrane, I doubt most other jazz albums of the 1950s and 1960s were selling more than 50,000 copies, and many probably sold a lot less than that. In era where Time Magazine and the culture in general paid more lip service to middlebrow/highbrow art than it does today, Thelonious Monk could achieve the succès d’estime of making the cover of Time (which he did) while still being a cult artist at best when it came to record sales.
It was a fabulous concept and I think my friend @chacha saw it in person when it toured as an art show in California . I missed the show but I do have the limited edition LP he made of 100 copies of the White Album being played all at once at once and then pressed onto a two record set. Really cool conceptual art.
Again I beg to differ. Lee Morgan- Sidewinder was used as the background music during the broadcast of the 1964 World Series, then sold to a car manufacturer to be used in a commercial. Between 1950 and 1965, Jazz was more popular among mainstream listeners than we give it credit for. Pre 1950 we had Big Bands, which was a form of Jazz made for dancing, and after 1965 we had RnR which came to dominate popular music. But during that golden 15yr period, Jazz was extremely popular.
I was suggesting a mix of mono releases along with the stereo releases - real mono, not the fold down. And I'm not suggesting a mono/stereo of the same album either. Just tapping into the vast catalogue of earlier recordings.
Lee Morgan’s Sidewinder was an outlier crossover “hit,” as was Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five.” You can point to this or that jazz tune that was kinda sorta mainstream popular, and even to the famous example of Louis Armstrong hitting #1 in 1964 with “Hello Dolly,” just as the Beatles were blowing up, but, by the 1960s, instrumental jazz wasn’t selling remotely as much as were pop, rock, R&B, and vocal artists like Frank Sinatra.
I would love to see some Tone Poets from the 78rpm and 10" LP eras. And they don't have to replicate what's been done on LP before necessarily - there's room to rethink things here, IMHO.
It would definitely be cool to see some of the earlier mono only stuff get a high quality reissue. I think it was actually mentioned earlier in the thread. Myself and others want some of the early 50s 10 inch era stuff in this series.