Milan Music: The V-Discs Collection

[neveronfriday]

Well, I picked these up in a shop around the corner, 4-CD box (4th disc has some Charles deGaulle speeches etc. on it), shrink-wrapped for 3 Euro. Before I actually listen to them, here the details:

These are the contents:

V.A. The V-Discs-Collection. Editions Milan Music (distrib. by BMG). France 1995.

Disc 01: The Big Bands

a) Count Basie (4 tunes)

b) Duke Ellington (3 tunes)

c) Benny Carter (2 tunes)

d) Lionel Hampton (2 tunes)

e) Jimmie Lunceford (1 tune)

Disc 02: The Combos and The Soloists

a) Combos (Hot Lips Page; Louis Armstrong; Nat King Cole; etc.)

b) The Soloists (Coleman Hawkins; Fats Waller; Art Tatum; Earl Hines, Lionel Hampton)

Disc 03: The Singers

a) Armstrong (3 tunes)

b) Holiday (1 tune)

c) Jordan (3 tunes)

d) Ada Brown (1 tune)

e) Jimmy Rushing (3 tunes)

f) Fats Waller (1 tune)

Disc 04: Documents

"Discours du Général Leclerc, du Général de Gaulle, Communiqués des radios, Marche de la deuxiéme D.B.)

A first listen shows that the sound is really not all that bad. Are these some rip-off production? Does anyone know anything about this box? Internet info is, to say the least, sparse ( or in French, which basically means the same to me )

The thing looks sth like this (not quite, but almost).

Cheers!

Edited February 23, 2005 by deus62

[neveronfriday]

BTW: I do know about V-Discs, but obviously not nearly enough. I'm reading up on it now. But, I'd still like to know sth about this Milan label. Seems to be a legitimate if distributed through BMG?

[neveronfriday]

Interesting Link:

V-Discs: Overview

[brownie]

BTW: I do know about V-Discs, but obviously not nearly enough. I'm reading up on it now. But, I'd still like to know sth about this Milan label. Seems to be a legitimate if distributed through BMG?

This is the Milan website:

http://www.milanrecords.com/about/index.htm

Many of their jazz releases come from the archives of the Hot Club de France organization. Among their early releases were a couple of CDs that reissued VDiscs from the collection of French jazz critic Hugues Panassie who was the HCf founder.

[neveronfriday]

Thanks, Dr. Funkenstein.

Cheers!