hello everyone I noticed a while back that RCA has re-re-released the duke ellington blanton-webster band 3CD set. Needless to say, it's some of my favorite ellington. The question I'm hoping someone can answer is: Is the sound quality on the latest version any better than the RCA/Bluebird release (number 5659-2-RB)? The reason I ask is that I recall there being a number of complaints from people on this list about the lousy mastering on the RCA/Bluebird set, but I'm having no luck (using the web) trying to find out if the newest release is a brand new mastering job.... On a slightly different note, I noticed that the reviewer of ellington's anatomy of a murder on allmusic.com mentions that "Ellington naturally subordinated his music to the action in the film, but...." (the emphasis being on the 'but'). I found this statement interesting, because of the implication that writing music for visual narrative somehow implies a 'dilution' or otherwise negative impact on the music. Personally, of all of the Ellington I have, 'Anatomy of a murder' ranks as one of my favorites precisely because of the constraints within which ellingtion has to work. These constraints lead him to write nusic he otherwise might not have written. (e.g., the end of 'upper and outest', to name one moment - and there are many.) Relating this to John Zorn, I recently purchased 'invitation to a suicide' (Filmworks 13) on the basis of reading a number of positive reviews. However, while the music is enjoyable, it basically consists of a series of thematically related jams (where a number of them have no chord changes). Now, I haven't seen the film, but nothing in the cd booklet gives the impression that the film is a relatively slow series of variations on the same visual theme. Given what soundtrack music could be (as illustrated by Ellington's 'anatomy of a murder' - or many other soundracks by other composers) I must admit I was a bit dissapointed. Whit