Music Archivist Zev Feldman Talks About His 10 New Titles for Record Store Day

Record Store Day 2024 arrives April 20th and brings with it a wide array of exciting releases, especially for jazz enthusiasts. 

One of the names that has become synonymous with RSD releases is Zev Feldman. Each year, the man known as the Jazz Detective oversees a series of high quality releases within the genre, most of them archival in nature. 

Some recordings have circulated on bootleg, others were thought lost to history, while others languished in drawers, basements, attics, or garages (sometimes metaphorically; other times quite literally) before being discovered and brought to the public’s attention.  

We recently spoke with Feldman about the impressive list of RSD 2024 releases, each one delivered with utmost care for sound quality and packaging, each arriving with impossibly detailed and thoughtful liner notes not only about the music contained within the sleeves of the records but the long-term impact the artists who created the music have had on successive generations. 

Each of the releases that Feldman has overseen for RSD will appear first on vinyl with compact disc versions following soon after. 

Feldman was deeply generous with his time and spoke about each release in careful, painstaking detail. Though our conversation has been edited for clarity and length, Feldman’s passion, we hope, remains deeply intact. 

 

You have this wonderful set from Sonny Rollins, Freedom Weaver: The 1959 European Tour Records (Resonance Records; 4 LP). He’s an interesting figure because he’s not someone who has been big on archival releases, there really haven’t even been major reissue campaigns. 

These were recordings that had been circulating among collectors for a very long time. There had been a bootleg CD release, the music was on YouTube. It’s 1959 Sonny Rollins, taking chances, playing without a net. It’s daring music of an epic proportion. To think that this music had been wronged by the fact that it had been bootlegged and that the rights holders had not been treated well was very disappointing. 

Sonny Rollins didn’t need to do this. He’s very selective. It’s a privilege that he wanted to collaborate with us again. Several years ago, we did Rollins in Holland, which had some previously bootlegged and previously unissued studio recordings. I’d like to think maybe it was just a good experience all the way around. Most importantly, it was respectful to the music. 

 

There were some rapid lineup changes on the dates that Freedom Weaver is drawn from and you can hear this rapid evolution in the music. 

Absolutely. Different musicians bring different flavor. In the drum chair, as you alluded to, we have Pete “La Roca” Sims, we have Joe Harris and we also have Kenny Clarke. It was 1959, so much new ground was being cut in this music and Sonny Rollins was on the frontline. He’s playing in a trio which was avant-garde for the time.

 

You have Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s Live in France: The 1966 Concert in Limoges (Deep Digs; 2 LP). I think that, for anyone who hasn’t really listened to her recordings, who maybe only has a passing acquaintance with her music, they’ll want this. It’s a good entry point and not only is the performance spectacular but the recording itself is gorgeous. 

I take a lot of pride in this project. These are tapes that I live to tell people I literally carried on my back for seven years. I discovered them originally in 2017 in Paris. It was just a hunch. I was going on background, knowing that Sister Rosetta had played Europe many times and in fact had built an audience for herself there. 

I first became aware of Sister Rosetta Tharpe in the early 2000s. I worked at Universal Music Group at the time. We reissued Gospel Train on Mercury Records. I remember being struck with that music and loving it. She is a legend. This concert is not just good, it’s great. We had to make that distinction. It’s also, dare I say, a guitar player’s record. 

 

Tell me about Shelly Manne and Jazz from The Pacific Northwest (Reel to Real; 2 LP). 

That was a personal project for me. A few years back, I had the chance to meet Shelly’s widow, the late, great Flip Manne, who lived, I believe to 102-years-old. I went to her with the prospect of releasing these recordings and she was totally into it. This album is comprised of two sets of performances. First of all, recordings that were made at the very first 1958 Jazz Festival. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Tim Jackson at Monterey for a number of years. I first met him when I worked at Concord Music Group in the mid-2000s when we did a series with the Monterey Festival. I would see him around and, as I got further into the archival realm, I would say, “Boy, it’d be great if we could find something to do!” 

These recordings were out there. I also knew about the recordings from Seattle at the Penthouse club. These recordings seemed to go together. “Whoa! This is the Pacific Northwest!” I just wanted to present these two performances, including two half-hour broadcasts. It’s an amazing period in the music, from ’58 to ’66. It just goes to show you the power of live jazz. There’s something incredible that you get outside of the studio. The spirit and the feeling are incredible. 

Shelly Manne has never had an archival tribute and I thought we needed some serious cannon fire. 

 

The two Cannonball Adderley releases, Burnin’ in Bordeaux: Live in France 1969 (Elemental; 2 LP) and Poppin’ In Paris: Live At L’Olympia 1972 (Elemental; 2 LP) are both incredible. I had such a visceral reaction to them. 

These recordings are incredible. They come from the Radio ORTF archives. These were broadcast quality recordings made professionally for the legendary producer at ORTF, the legendary André Francis. If you’ve ever listened to Miles Davis in Europe, André Francis is the guy at the beginning of the recording introducing the bands. These recordings represent two bands with Cannonball that are equally as great but from different times. 

We start to see the transition. First we have a recording from the Bordeaux Jazz Festival in 1969 with Cannonball and Nat but also Joe Zawinul, Victor Gaskin and Roy McCurdy. We also have this recording from L’Olympia in ’72 which is this transition into different music. Cannonball was evolving. I’ve had people say to me, “It even sounds a little bit like what Miles was doing at the time.” Yeah, things were changing. 

This band, in ’72, had the late, great George Duke who was playing with The Mothers of Invention around the same time. A tale of two bands, two road warriors, the music is just spectacular. 

 

Yusef Lateef’s Atlantis Lullaby: The Concert from Avignon (Elemental; 2 LP) is another great release. He’s one of those artists that I feel strongly about and, as you detail in the liner notes, you had a personal relationship with him. 

I did. I befriended Yusef Lateef when I was 20 years old. I was a communications/radio broadcasting major at my college in the Washington, D.C. area. I was the music director and, truth be told, it was like an adult contemporary station. We all had specialty programs and I had my weekly radio program that was on for a couple of hours and I would play jazz. It was my job to procure music for me to play. I saw an ad in the back of DownBeat for YAL Records in Amherst, Massachusetts. I called the number and, lo and behold, Yusef Lateef picked up the phone and we kind of hit it off. He was a very nice man. I was telling him about my show. He was considerably older than me. May more than 40 years. He was an inquisitive guy. Brilliant. Always learning. We had this friendship for this period where we stayed in touch. 

I was introduced to his music from what he was working on at the time before I got turned on to Prestige and Savoy and Impulse and all these great records that had made. I was listening to a lot of the stuff that he was making with Adam Rudolph. I still have these recordings here in my library. He would send me postcards when he was on the road. 

One time, unsolicited, [he reached out and] wanted to know who our faculty head was. He wrote a letter of recommendation reinforcing the fact that us kids at the station were doing a great job. I felt kindness from him, I just really felt that he possessed some of the greatest traits in being a good person. I wish that we would have stayed in contact. But me and my classmates, there are a few of us who keep in touch, and we say, “Remember Yusef Lateef? Sending these postcards and reaching out?” It was just something memorable and here, all these years later, when I’ve become deeply impacted by his music, I really love this period in the early 1970s. 

The music on Atlantis Lullaby represents an amazing band that he had with Kenny Barron, who just owns the stage. Bob Cunningham on bass and now we just lost Tootie Heath on drums. This was a virtuosic ensemble that could bring the audience to their feet. I want more people to become more interested in this man. It wasn’t just about Eastern sounds. He was a man who was evolving. He was reading, he was learning. I think we could all take a page from his book and be better human beings. 

 

The Mal Waldron and Steve Lacy release, The Mighty Warriors: Live in Antwerp (Elemental; 2 LP) is just phenomenal. I listened to it and thought, “When was this made?” Because, to me, it sounds at least two steps ahead of contemporary music. 

Thank you for saying that. I feel that way. I’ve had a chance to do a major deep dive over the last decade on Mal Waldron. I love the complete output of music that he made. There’ always something exciting. These gentlemen are master musicians. They are the mighty warriors. They are painters. They are communicating in ways that speak to their own individual styles. What’s so remarkable about Mal Waldron is that he had his own language of phrasing, lines, comping. He spoke a certain way. He composed a certain way, which was all his own. 

My dear friend Josh Rosenthal from Tompkins Square Records and I did a Mal record a few years ago, Searching in Grenoble. That’s a solo piano concert. He and I were just rapping one day and he said, “You have to go back and listen to all these John Coltrane albums on Prestige.” Mal was on many of them. But, more than that, he contributed so many compositions to the canon of Coltrane and others. He’s a composer. He goes way beyond his affiliation with Lady Day. I think he’s one of the most remarkable artists in this music. I am so inspired when I listen to him. 

 

Sun Ra At the Showcase: Live in Chicago 1976-1977 (Jazz Detective; 2 LP) captures him in a city that was important to him in many ways and it’s everything we love about him. 

This is the very first production I’ve done with the Sun Ra estate. The music was compiled by Michael D. Anderson who has worked on most of the Sun Ra projects that come out. There was a lot of research done. Michael put these recordings together that happened over two years with an amazing band. Chicago was one of the places that the Arkestra was based for many years. Joe Segal at The Showcase was a champion of Sun Ra and brought him in many times. These are great recordings that capture inside and outside moments of bliss. 

 

We also have Art Tatum’s Jewels in The Treasure Box: The 1953 Chicago Blue Note Jazz Club Recordings (Resonance; 3 LP). 

At Resonance this year we’ve achieved something we’ve wanted to do for a long time. We’re enormous fans of the great Art Tatum. This collection is something that I would say is along the lines of greatness with the Dead Sea Scrolls. You don’t make these sorts of discoveries every day but several years ago we were contacted by a man named Parker Fishel [from the Bob Dylan Center]. We were eventually introduced to the family that owned The Blue Note jazz club in Chicago. The Holzfeind family. These were recordings that were recordings that were made in 1953. This was a group that toured a lot together. There is a telepathic sort of power. They connect on those performances. The music is remarkable. We wanted to build something that was just extraordinary. I think there’s great reason for jubilation for this release. 

 

In Perfect Harmony: The Lost Album (Jazz Detective; 1 LP) by Chet Baker and Jack Sheldon is a classic Jazz Detective release in many ways, but not least of which being that there’s an incredible story that goes with it. 

That came to me last year. The author and historian Jeff Gold referred two gentlemen my way. One of them was the legendary filmmaker Frank Marshall, the other was a co-producer of his, Jeff Pollack. Frank’s father was a very important guitarist and arranger and producer named Jack Marshall. In 1972, Jack Marshall brought Chet Baker and Jack Sheldon, who were the best of friends, together in a recording studio in Tustin, California with a group of players who made this studio album. It had been mixed and mastered and, as the story goes from Mr. Marshall, his father was shopping this recording and he suddenly had a heart attack and passed away in 1973. The tape just moved over with the family archives. This is a remarkable document because it’s not a live recording, it’s a studio recording, it’s a statement. This recording rewrites the history books on Chet Baker.