A Robert Collins Master Recording.
Artist / Title: Weather Report
Date April 15, 1983
Location: Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, CA
Seats: Middle section, middle area
Deck: Nakamichi 350
Mics: Nakamichi CM-300 (L, R)
Source: A:C Master Tape, 2-Mic Stereo
Sample Rate 44.1Khz, 16-bit (CD) (FLAC)
Rating: A/A-
Length: 130 Minutes
Also Available:
* DVD-Audio, 96 Khz, 24-bit version of this show is also available.
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Musicians:
Josef Zawinul Keyboards
Wayne Shorter Saxophones
Victor Bailey Bass Guitar
Omar Hakim Drums
Jose Rossy Percussion, Concertina
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About this recording:
This concert has another story of its own, and is another reason I waited so long
to create this Weather Report memorial concert series. Like the Starlight Bowl
concert, this is another of my favorites. But the recording has problems, and the
problems take a lot of time and effort to fix. So instead of working on this a
long time ago, I waited all of these years to gain the motivation to work on it.
This show is a solid A-rated show, and the recording quality is for the most part
A-rated as well. The new band has been together for a year by now, and they perform
like a well oiled machine. Like the Starlight Bowl show, there are moments of pure
magic on this recording. One such moment is during the encore, during an improvised
piece I called "Delicate Fantasy." Synthesizer technology was just starting to get
real interesting. For the very first times, synthesizers were able to perfectly mimic
an actual instrument. But this wasn't the magical moment. But during an interplay
between Wayne and Joe, Zawinul dials up a perfect Tympani on his synthesizer. But
as Joe moves up the scale on his synthesized Tympani, the instrument (and it's
waveform) morphs into a perfect French Horn. That was a pure magical moment back
in 1983.
Another moment came during the second encore of "Where the Moon Goes." We've all
heard jazz players do a form of call and response. But in this case, the challenger
was Joe Zawinul, and the response came from Omar Hakim on Drums. Yes, it's a
synthesizer vs. drums on call and response. That was another truly magical moment.
But alas, the recording has problems. The first minute of the recording doesn't
sound so good. You will hear that. The beginning of the concert the levels were
sporadic (at best) and there was lots of microphone muffling. To fix this, I was
lucky enough to have a second source recording the same concert. The quality isn't
the best, and you can hear this during the first minute of the concert. There are
also times during the concert where there is apparent oversaturation of the tape
recording. This isn't on the master tape. The master tape levels are sufficiently
low that this oversaturation should not have occurred during recording. But I
noticed this at least three places on the recording, and all three places original
levels were not set incorrectly. I can only conclude this oversaturation sound came
from the house PA system, possibly caused by overdriving the preamps of the mixing
console.
The original recording also suffered two very bad tape turns. In both cases, the
song had ended while the tape was turning. That's very hard to fix. Using the
second source recording, you would think it was possible to get complete versions
of each song. Nope, he turn the tapes during the same songs as I did. To fix
one of them, I had to take what I had, and use the very end that was captured on
the alternate recording to create a false ending. That means about 16-bars of
music are missing. The second tape turn was much more fortunate. My recording
captured longer before the tape turn than the alternate second source. I was
able to splice the two back together to fix the song. The sonic quality of the
second source is noticeably poor. But I did the best I could to make the
equalization sound the same. Finally, one of the microphone cords was cutting
in and out during the encore. There was just enough sonic material to perfectly
fix this in almost every case; but it was very time consuming. In the three or
so cases that were too excessive to fix, I had to revert to mono; but usually only
a second or so at a time.
But even with all of these warts, the show is one of my favorites. It's an
A-quality show with an A-quality recording. It's a must have for any Weather
Report collection.
Weather Report Memorial Concert Series
This has been long overdue, and will still take a while to complete.
I wanted to release all of my Weather Report, Wayne Shorter, and Jaco
Pastorius recordings as part of a "Memorial" to Weather Report and its
members. Some of these recordings were given to friends many years ago, but
most have never had a proper mastering or released. So to most people, I
think these will be completely new recordings. And when you see how many of
them and how good the recording quality and show quality is, then you'll
probably ask: WTF...why haven't these ever been released? Answer is
simple: time. I knew releasing this many previously unreleased recordings
was going to take a lot of time.
Some people may have copies of these one or more generations down from the
master. All of these will be coming to you directly from the master
recordings.
Here's what to expect in the series, and in the order to be released:
Date Artist Venue Recording Show Release status
1980-02-29 Weather Report Perkins Palace, Pasadena California B A- Previously unreleased
1981-06-21 Weather Report Playboy Jazz Festival, Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood California A- A Previously unreleased
1982-06-01 Weather Report Starlight Bowl, San Diago California A A+ Previously unreleased
1982-06-19 Weather Report Playboy Jazz Festival, Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood California B/B+ B+ Previously unreleased
1983-04-15 Weather Report Universal Amphitheatre, Universal City California A/A- A Previously unreleased
1984-06-16 Weather Report Playboy Jazz Festival, Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood California A- TBD Remastered
1988-07-08 Zawinul Syndicate Hollywood Palace, Hollywood California A TBD Previously unreleased
1990-08/25 Zawinul Syndicate Concord Pavilion, Concord California A- TBD Previously unreleased
1997-08-31 Zawinul Syndicate Yoshi's, Oakland California A+ A Previously unreleased
1998-09-12 Zawinul Syndicate Yoshi's, Oakland California A+ TBD Previously unreleased
1999-09-02 Zawinul Syndicate Yoshi's, Oakland California A+ TBD Previously unreleased
2000-05-06 Zawinul Syndicate Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco California A- TBD Previously unreleased
1979-09-16 Joni Mitchell Greek Theatre, Los Angeles California B+ A Remastered
1982-01-10 Jaco Pastorius Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles California A- A- Remastered
1982-04-15 Jaco Pastorius Rissmiller Country Club, Reseda California B+ A- Previously unreleased
1983-11-20 Jaco Pastorius Beverly Theatre, Los Angeles, California A TBD Previously unreleased
1984-06-17 Jaco Pastorius Playboy Jazz Festival, Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood California A Note* Previously unreleased
1997-09-04 Hancock / Shorter Villa Montalvo Mountain Winery, Saratoga California A- A- Re-seed
Note: This is the "rumored" Jaco recording written about in a Jaco biography.
The author writes about a "rumored" recording made at the Playboy Jazz Festival
when Jaco tore the stage apart and his own musicians eventually refused to play
for him. Playboy Jazz promoters eventually turned the stage on Jaco to put an
end to his set. This is the recording referenced in the book. It's
depressing.
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Lineage:
AUD> Nakamichi 350
---> Nakamichi Dragon (playback)
---> Korg MR1000 (5.6 Mhz, 1-bit master tape)
---> Down sample to 96Khz, 32-bit using Korg Audiogate
---> iZotope RX-Advanced (noise reduction, spectral editing)
---> Sound Forge (put the concert back together)
---> iZotope RX-Advanced (downsample, dither)
---> CD Architect (CD Audio)
---> EAC
---> FLAC
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Sound Samples:
Sample-1 (Molasses Run):
http://www.rcollins.org/concerts/mp3/WR-19830415-Sample-1.mp3
Sample-1 (Delicate Fantasy):
http://www.rcollins.org/concerts/mp3/WR-19830415-Sample-2.mp3
Sample-1 (Where the Moon Goes):
http://www.rcollins.org/concerts/mp3/WR-19830415-Sample-3.mp3
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Song List:
Disc-1:
Start End Length Name
------------ ------------ ------------ --------------------------
00:00:00.000 00:10:32.101 00:10:32.101 Procession
00:10:32.101 00:19:54.430 00:09:22.329 Fast City
00:19:54.430 00:30:13.012 00:10:18.582 The Peasant
00:30:13.012 00:45:48.981 00:15:35.969 D-Flat Waltz
00:45:48.981 00:58:54.556 00:13:05.575 Blue Sound - Note 3
00:58:54.556 01:05:03.832 00:06:09.276 Molasses Run
Disc-2:
Start End Length Name
------------ ------------ ------------ --------------------------
00:00:00.000 00:07:55.975 00:07:55.975 Plaza Real
00:07:55.975 00:11:21.393 00:03:25.418 Percussion Solo
00:11:21.393 00:28:03.057 00:16:41.664 Two Lines
00:28:03.057 00:29:46.106 00:01:43.050 8:30
00:29:46.106 00:31:01.310 00:01:15.203 Black Market
00:31:01.310 00:31:32.726 00:00:31.417 Elegant People
00:31:32.726 00:33:12.056 00:01:39.330 Badia
00:33:12.056 00:36:47.526 00:03:35.470 A Remark You Made
00:36:47.526 00:41:08.257 00:04:20.730 Birdland
00:41:08.257 00:52:19.371 00:11:11.114 Delicate Fantasy
00:52:19.371 01:05:14.283 00:12:54.912 Where The Moon Goes