A Man of Great Importance

I've been doing some research...I'll just leave it there for now, but in the process, I've found some inaccuracies on All Music, which is a very good source of information on discographies, session dates, et al.

But, I've also submitted about half a dozen corrections to them of errors I've found on their site and I noticed the first of the changes tonight. Does that make me a published author and expert?

"Kenny Dorham's Memorial Album" was listed as a compilation, but it has a single session date and a single band. It actually was kind of a B.S. name. It was originally titled "The Arrival of Kenny Dorham" on a label called Jaro and re-released post-humously with the memorial name on the still lesser known Xanadu label, making it sound like a compilation.

But, I straightened that mess out! Great record, by the way. A very nice surprise.

I've got some other edits into them too and suspect that I'll make a habit out it as much as I take from them. I wonder if they will ever send me a note either thanking me or telling me to cut it out?

 

The freakin' stalkarazzi won't even let me go through a fast food drive through with my babies.

 

That's an interesting point and has some solid validity. It is one of the reasons that I'm doing what I'm doing, which I'll disclose at some point.

For now, go to AllMusic.com and look at the musicians credited as having played on Kenny Dorhams "Jazz Contrasts" album. Unless they've made my corrections, you'll see that it's quite a crowded quinted acording to them.

These are the historical archives of the future. I've been taking my opportunities to get what aural history I can when I can and do what research I can. Lately it's compelled me to clean up some of these inaccuracies when I find them. More to come.

Ed, are you keeping a list of the things you're going to kick my ass for? I'm willing to take a beating, but I just don't want you to lose track and then have to come back and finish the job after I think it's over. []

 

HA! I'm not familar with the man's work, but yeah...I see your point. That's not what I'm going for.

My "research" started as very self serving. I was collecting and transcribing Butch Warren recordings, especially after meeting him and seeing him play in DC in the fall. Butch Warren recordings are not exactly famous, even though some of them are very famous-in-jazz-circles records. But, I'm using things like jazzdisco.org and allmusic as sources trying to find a complete list. It's helpful, but then I'm finding some historically interesting things, like Ike Quebec sessions that he recorded that weren't released. I know the dates, tracks, musicians, the number Blue Note assigned to it, but they rejected it for some reason.

But then, there's an Ike Quebec complilation the AllMusic credits Butch Warren on. Except that none of the songs on the compilation on the compilation match the tracks on the rejected session. But, AllMusic can't be wrong can it? Except that they claim that Jimmy Garrison played on Kenny Dorham's Jazz Contrasts, which he most certainly did not.

Butch's bio says he played in Monk's band from 1963-1964, but he's on Monk albums from Japan, Europe and in the US as early as '59 and as late as '63 or maybe '64. I want to fix that because while Oscar Pettiford and Scott LaFaro and Ray Brown have secured their place in history, I want Butch's to be accurate. Which records he was on, what song's he composed, who he played with.

And, where I started and my own, primary motives are just trying to make sure I know where and what his recording are so that I can prowl my friend's record collections and all of Seattle's dusty record shops (there are a great many) for what I can't find.

I fear I may be becoming the world's foremost authority on the discography of BW, in the process (and I'm learning quite a bit about Jackie McLean, Kenny Dorham, Booker Ervin and a few others in the process) I feel obliged to clean up the wikisphere for the future generation of unprofessional, unpaid researchers, to Bruce's point.