Howard McGhee March 1, 2, 4, or 5, 1947

According to Sutherland & Burton, these Benedetti recordings are mostly incomplete, since he was apparently mainly concerned with recording just Bird's solos. This leads to some serious scholarly questions that must be asked about the sessions Burton & Sutherland list as being recorded by Benedetti on March 1st, 1947, March 2nd, 1947 and a "third" which was recorded sometime on March 1, 2, 4, or 5 of 1947. Since Benedetti only recorded Bird's solos, and Sutherland/Burton don't differentiate between the duplicated tunes from March 1st and March 2nd in the third multiple-date session, isn't it possible that the solos were from the same master take? This is not to critique their scholarship, of course, just to give a caveat that, for example, the "Cheers" from the "March 2nd, 1947" session is not NECESSARILY from a different take than the "Cheers" from "March 1, 2, 4, or 5 1947" Since they are all incomplete, we would like to know more about what determines the exact date of recording for any of them. -JS

Burton says that the excerpt heard of track 8, identified as "prisoner of love", sounds--in fact-- like Body and Soul. He and Sutherland both say that "Past Due" is a new melody played over the chords of "Relaxin' at Camarillo". -JS