[Dixielandjazz] Carnegie Hall 1938 Goodman

[JimDBB at aol.com]

In a message dated 7/10/2003 4:01:59 PM Central Standard Time, 
richard.broadie at gte.net writes:

> Some little known info about the '38 Carnegie Hall Concert:
> 
> Albert Marx paid for the recording session and made all the arrangements
> with no participation on the part of BG.  Sometime after the concert was
> over, Benny asked Albert if he could "borrow" a copy of the Carnegie
> concert.  The tapes Benny's daughter, Rachel, found in the closet in 1950
> were the copies Albert had sent him.  Goodman made tons of money from this
> concert and he never paid Albert a penny for the recording rights and
> deinied any knowlege of Albert's contribution when confronted on the issue.
> Obviously had Albert received his share of royalties, it could have cost
> Goodman a bundle.
> 
> After Albert moved to LA from Palm Springs, he had me search his former home
> in hopes that his "lost" master tapes could be found.  I had no luck in
> locating them.
> 
> Albert never received the credit due him.  Were it not for him, the
> recording would never have been made.  He eventually was given a Grammy for
> his contribution  from someone BG acknowledged as being responsible for the
> recording but refused to keep the Grammy because he didn't feel he rightly
> disserved it..  I can't remember the exact story, but Albert showed me the
> Grammy in his LA home and stated that, until the lost masters could be
> located, this was his best proof of his claims.
> 
> The master tapes were eventually located in one of Albert's "vaults" shortly
> after his death and were used in a reissue of the whole concert, including
> one song that had never been included in the original due to extremely poor
> audio problems.  Guess that's proof that Albert's claims were valid,.  I've
> heard both the master and the BG closet versions and can't say I heard many
> significant differences between the master and Goodman's copy.  Of course
> the "clean" missing song is an indication that Marx really did have the
> first eneration masters.
> 
> I had the pleasure of reuniting Albert with Jess Stacey around 1989 at a
> convention.  It was the first time they'd seen each other since the '39
> concert.  Turns out my deed wasn't all that impressive.  They were both
> scheduled to speak on the same panel later that day.  Still it was fun to be
> there and witness the actual reunion along with my wife Sharon.  We were the
> only other people in the room to witness a long overdue hug between them.
> Keep in mind that that recording really put Jess on the map.  And it was
> that recording that hooked me on jazz when I was very young.
> 
> Enough ramblings for today.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed them.
> 
>   Dick  -


    This is a very interesting bit of history.  Thanks for sharing this.  It 
sure sounds like Goodman.  One wonders why he had  to be such a penurious 
jerk, forever screwing somebody out of rightful money.  A creative genius on one 
hand and a miserable creep hoarding his millions on the other.

Jim Beebe