The Jazz Tome
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thejazztome.info
The Jazz Tome
@thejazztome.info
530 followers 240 following 270 posts
A jazz fan since hearing Blues & The Abstract Truth in 2004, I search for 60+ year old ephemera so you can read while you listen.

Visit https://thejazztome.info for 500+ albums of liner notes & reviews, ad/paywall free.

Ran by @grogg.bsky.social in PDX
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thejazztome.info
It sounds silly, but listening and enjoying myself is much different than the rush that comes from researching. When the two are feeding off each other... that's the good stuff.
October 29, 2025 at 9:07 AM
thejazztome.info
I'm several hours late, but I only saw one Ahmad Jamal mention in the replies. I feel the need to shout out Horace Silver, too.
October 27, 2025 at 8:27 PM
thejazztome.info
This is me, at 1:30am on a Friday night.
Charlie Day, from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, looking extremely frazzled as he explains a conspiracy. He's wearing a short sleeve blue dress shirt, with a brown striped tie, talking excitedly while leaning against a cork board holding approximately 300 pieces of paper with red string linking some of them, while holding a cigarette in his other hand.
October 25, 2025 at 8:42 AM
thejazztome.info
Who did Mingus' ex-wife, Celia, end up with after divorcing Charles? You guessed it, Saul Zaentz! The timeline is rough, but Mingus was "unofficially" married to his next wife, Sue, in 1966, so maybe Celia helped facilitate the the 1968 record deal? Maybe she didn't have his best interest in mind?
A snippet of an obituary taken from here: https://ecologistics.org/memory-celia-zaentz/ Celia had an amazing life, marrying jazz bassist Charles Mingus in 1951 and starting legendary jazz label Debut Records with him in New York in 1952. Celia was friends with all of the greats at that time, including Charlie Parker, Max Roach, Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell. After divorcing Mingus, Celia moved to San Francisco, where she took a job with a small Berkeley label, Fantasy Records. She fell in love and married Saul Zaentz and the couple eventually bought Fantasy. Shortly after, they discovered John Fogerty and Creedence Clearwater Revival, which became one of the biggest bands of the 1970s. Saul had always wanted to produce movies and they formed Fantasy Films, which later went on to produce "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," "Amadeus," and "The English Patient." Celia went from hobnobbing with jazz greats to the inner circles of Hollvwood.
October 25, 2025 at 8:42 AM
thejazztome.info
Who was running Debut (later Fantasy) records at the time? None other than Saul Zaentz! The guy John Fogerty held a long long grudge with over his handling of CCR during the same late 60s period. Not exactly who I'd have expected Mingus to sign with after angrily fighting music industry corruption.
A news clip from the March 29, 1968 issue of the San Francisco Chronicle. Mingus Makes New Recording Deal Ralph J. Gleason CHARLES MINGUS, the great bassist and composer whose plan to form a record company outside the formal channels of the business of music, ran into financial difficulties, is making his records available again. Mingus has made an agreement with Debut Records (which are distributed nationally by Fantasy Records) to issue his celebrated "Mingus at Monterey," two LP packages as well as other material from the Mingus label. The Mingus at Monterey package, which has been unavailable for almost a year, was sold via mail order by Mingus for some time with extraordinary reaction. * * * THE MINGUS performance at Monterey was one of the most exciting and famous concerts of the ten years of Monterey. Mingus' album from it achieved an amazing reputation despite the fact that it was not available through ordinary channels. It was the subject of unanimous critical approval throughout the jazz world. Mingus, who is presently in New York where he is working on a series of ballets for the Boston Ballet, had been handling the entire operation of the record company, an overwhelming task for a musician. Early this month he concluded an arrangement with Saul Zaentz, who has been operating Debut Records for several years, to issue the Monterey album and the other albums which Mingus issued on the private label: Mingus' Town Hall Concert, 1964; Mingus' My Favorite Quintet (a 1965 concert at the Tyrone Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis) and "Music Written for Monterey but Not Heard" (the album of the 1965 Monterey music as it was performed at U.C.L.A.). Debut Records itself was originally formed by Mingus in the early Fifties to issue several single discs and a number of concert and studio recordings' by his group and other jazz players.
October 25, 2025 at 8:42 AM
Reposted by The Jazz Tome
steventurous.bsky.social
Also: Miles Davis. Story from a bass player subbing in his band.
October 22, 2025 at 1:38 PM
thejazztome.info
A favorite of mine! thejazztome.info/teddy-charle...
Teddy Charles – The Teddy Charles Tentet (1956) – The Jazz Tome
thejazztome.info
October 18, 2025 at 4:05 PM
thejazztome.info
Oops, replied with the wrong account
October 10, 2025 at 5:09 PM
thejazztome.info
One thing I particularly appreciated is that they don't pull any punches talking about what a shithole America was for black musicians.
October 10, 2025 at 4:08 PM
thejazztome.info
I knew that Gerry battled a heroin addiction on and off through the 50s (as did a lot of musicians). I did not know, however, that he spent 3.5 months in prison including three weeks in maximum security, in part for taking a rap for Chet Baker. It doesn't sound like it was pleasant.
An paragraph excerpt from a piece on Gerry Mulligan written by Nat Hentoff that appeared in the 3/28/59 issue of The New Yorker: "For nineteen or twenty days, I went through the inferno. It was a fantastic experience. I'd been working on music and was in a highly charged state of mind, and also I'd been having a fair amount of freedom. Now I was stuck in a cell about four feet wide and six feet long with two other guys. There were two bunks, and one of us had to sleep on the floor. We had one partial meal in the morning, another in the evening, and nothing at midday. No mail, no visitors, nothing to read, and any time the guard came, we had to jump up and stand at attention. We went to the showers once a week and spent the rest of the time in the cell, which contained the two bunks, a john, and a sink.
October 7, 2025 at 8:24 AM