Starting over

A lot of Steve Oliver, Rippingtons, and Spyro Gyra!

A friend and I both play guitar and are looking into learning some current and past C-Jazz for gigs and parties. Trying to figure out the chords for Tradewinds and Feeling Good (both Steve Oliver). Then I've got to program a MIDI backup with the keyboards, bass, and drums. This will take a while.

Thinking of adding some George Benson and Chuck Mangione, so I'll be listening a lot to those too!

Doing my part to stimulate the economy. I spent NOTHING before Christmas, then took advantage of the sales after.
Hadn't bought any music forever, and it took trips to Borders, Best Buy and Circuit City just to round these up:
PET SHOP BOYS - Pop Art / These two are geniuses in my mind
MARC ANTOINE - Hi-Lo Split. Makes 3 discs of his I own now and I love them all.
EUGE GROOVE - Born to Groove. Had to update and it doesn't fail to please.
PETER WHITE - Playin' Favorites. Have always admired him, but this is this first disc I've owned. Will be looking for more.
RICK BRAUN/RICHARD ELIOT - R -n- R. Great combo on paper, great combo on tape.

I found it extremely frustrating trying to find new music to purchase. No, I don't own a I-Pod, and since the loss of our only local jazz radio station Christmas Day, I found it even more urgent to get out and buy some new jazz. It seem the ability to purchase new CD's is going more and more underground.
Someplace as "avant garde" as Border's pretends to be vs. Barnes and Noble in musical eclectic taste was somewhat lacking. I was shocked to find all three long-sought-after Pet Shop Boys offerings sitting on the shelf at Best Buy.

I think I need to plan a trip to the One World Theater in San Antonio, TX this year. They seem to have the hippest lineup of "MY" taste in music between jazz and new age acts such as Craig Chaquico.

'Aint gonna' find none of it in South Florida....

Everybody will find his way to his favorite music. Forget the old shops like Barnes & Nobles, Circuit City, Best Buy and so on. Internet rules today. There are also a lot websites where you can find the desired information about new releases. There is no reason for complain.

Way more into the classics this year than smooth, but I've re-discovered Ken Navarro and Ronny Jordan; they've been heavy in the rotation.

It depends on one's perspective, I suppose.
When you have to research the Internet to find what you're looking for, it's easy to lose patience and interest. Amazon, CD Baby and CD Universe are nice, but much of what people want isn't going to be carried at a one-stop shop. Instead, you'll have to get smooth jazz here, classic rock there, independent artists some other place. Not a problem if you're looking for that one special CD, but if you're a shopper who buys in bunches - especially if you want a little bit of this and a smidgen of that - you're probably going to have to make several purchases from various sites, which can add up in terms of shipping costs, finance charges (assuming you're using a credit card), and then there's the additional packaging (read: waste).
It's not as convenient as it used to be.
And that's if you already know what you want to buy.

Exactly, Jazzwriter.
I see no logic in the comments by hbh.
Call me cynical, but my internet buying experiences aren't anything to get excited about.
I ordered a bunch of CD's a couple of years ago from a brick and mortar retailer's website (stupendous selection if you have the time to sift through literally thousands of titles) but of course no warehouse on earth has all that in stock.
They purposely withheld sending my order until every last item was in stock and ready to ship. That was the only way around "free" shipping. Took over 30 days total.
Call me "stupid" or just "old" <which I'm NEITHER>, but there's just something God-given about the instant gratification of seeing, selecting, purchasing and then popping it into the CD changer on the way home.
I, for one, have no intrinsic trust in buying anything over the internet, and there is no sense of gratification whatsoever in doing so. You push some buttons, you enter your credit card information, and then you hope that it was all legitimate and will show up in 7-21 days...
Alright, let me date myself. I was but a wee youngin' and I went to the local record shop. Picture Cheech and Chong retail. I ordered an 8-track of the original Theme from Shaft.
The fact I was a Caucausian under the age of 10 might have seemed odd, but I placed my order with live human beings; they called when it came in; I picked it up and wore it out.
Mind you, I pulled the same stunt a few years later when I ordered an LP copy of "Autobahn" by Kraftwerk (who broke up today, ironically).
Sorry, but I have a lifetime of person to person purchasing experiences, so I don't think I'll be changing anytime soon.

Bulldog (Sorry I don't know your real name ;-)

Sometimes you have to change your mind as things are changing too.

"Sed fugit interea fugit irreparabile tempus." ("But it flees in the meantime: irretrievable time flees") - Virgil.

Joseph Diamond - Keep Your Dreams.

Salsa piano and jazz, what a great lost.

I buy most of my music on iTunes these days with the only problem being that there are rarely any liner notes or references to the particular musicians involved. Jazz pretty much demands knowing who the players are because of its basic nature. Occasionally iTunes will have a pdf booklet, however, it's rare.

This week I'm listening to:

1. "Hanalei Bay" - Lew Soloff (Pro-Arte Jazz, 1983)
2. "Speak Low" - Lew Soloff (Pro-Arte Jazz, 1987)
3. "The Best of Spyro Gyra" - (Amherst, 1997)
4. "While We're Young" - Gold Company (Western Michigan University, 2000)
5. "The Grace of Summer Light" - Ken Navarro