Hyland Harris sent a page from The Black Panther.

Wikipedia says:  “From 1968 to 1971, The Black Panther Party Newspaper was the most widely read Black newspaper in the United States, with a weekly circulation of more than 300,000. It sold for 25 cents. Every Panther was required to read and study the newspaper before they could sell it.”

The poet Afeni Shakur might be Tupac’s mother, we aren’t sure.

Check that lineup!

From the death of John Coltrane in 1967 to the death of Lee Morgan in 1972, jazz was at a peak, but sadly the biggest record companies had moved on from extensive documentation of the purest small group music.

George Cables says in his interview, “Slug’s had some music, man. I wish it was still there, so I could play back the walls, you wouldn’t believe some of the stuff there.Roy Haynes had two weeks at Slug’s. The first week was Chick Corea, Scotty Holt, and Joe Henderson, and the second week was McCoy Tyner, Ron Carter, and Wayne Shorter….Those were two of the best weeks of music I’ve ever seen in my life. ”

Neither of those Haynes groups were recorded.

1970: Who would have been in a Jackie McLean quintet? There’s a hole in the discography from 1967’s Demon Dance to the European Live At Montmartre in 1972. It’s a little easer to speculate with McCoy Tyner and Freddie Hubbard. McCoy’s rhythm section was possibly Herbie Lewis and Freddie Waits, Gary Bartz might have played horn. Freddie’s quintet might have been  Junior Cook, Harold Mabern or Kenny Barron, Louis Hayes, and a bassist like Wayne Dockery or Juni Booth. But ya never know: Ron Carter might have made the gig, too.

Betty Carter’s trio of that year was especially beautiful: Norman Simmons, Lisle Atkinson, and Al Harewood. Damn.

“Ro-Mas Orch.” is a mystery. [Update: on Twitter, Jeff Schwartz says, Ro-Mas was ROmulus Franceschini and Cal MASsey’s band.] Joe Lee Wilson wouldn’t record as a leader for a few years yet. And while Eddie Gale’s Ghetto Music is a famous record, somehow I think that project didn’t play live much.

All in all, what an event! Overseen by Coltrane’s close friend Cal Massey, who also was a great trumpeter…wonder if he sat in with anybody…

Of course, it is also interesting and important that these jazz legends were on the front lines of encouraging social change.

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Music and politics. This post might also by a good excuse to share Jarvis Tyner memorabilia. Jarvis is McCoy’s brother and the current Executive Vice Chair of the Communist Party USA. He ran for vice-president on the Gus Hall ticket.