Re: Night Music Sunny and the Sandman

From: Sun Ra and his Arkestra on behalf of daniel a. rigney iii Sent: Tuesday, May 06, 1997 7:21 PM To: SATURN@NIC.SURFNET.NL Subject: Night Music Sunny and the Sandman

I have respect, great respect, for a man who pays respects to those who've gone before. I think with all the hype on what's jazz, good jazz, straightahead, smooth jazz, out jazz etc. that we'rer dissing one of the great acheivements of television history. the man put Sun Ra on network television during the Reagan administration. Beat that!

Why has everybody been knocking Sanborn so much? He doesn't do much for me, but he plays music and he does it with sincerity. That should be enough to earn anyone's respect. Gil Evans certainly liked him. However, he wasn't the one who put Sun Ra on the show. Hal Willner did the booking.

having been livning in the NYC area at the time, I saw those programs when they were aired. It was a grand thing. The Sun Ra/Pixies program was terrific. my personal favorite though was the night he had Todd rundgren, Taj Mahal and Christian Marclay cover the Pirates of Penzance. you should've seen Taj in costume.

Dan Rigney

Miles and Hank Ballard were on the same show, and at the end of the show, usually a jam, everybody did "There's a Thrill Up On the Hill"; everybody but Miles, that is. I kept waiting for him to come out. That really would have been a thrill.

Jack Lefton