Heard the new Ellington/Blanton/Webster cds?

[medjuck]

Another vote for the Dreyfus sets. I only have the 2 Ellingtons and hear that there is another on the way. I guess I should start looking for some of the others too.

[BruceH]

When I listen to this stuff, I usually use the Smithsonian LP set or the French Jazz Tribune set, which seem to be somewhere in between.

[RZangpo2]

I generally prefer the approach that favors presence over surface cleanliness, although I know others who vastly prefer, say, the previous Sony Benny Goodman 1938 Carnegie Hall issue to the current one.  One thing I noticed on several of the earliest Ellington sides when I picked up the red BMG complete set was a squeaky, squealing sound that grew louder as the track approached its end.  I called BMG and talked to Joshua Sherman about this, and he explained it to me as "groove squeak."  Anybody else familiar with this phenomenon?  In any case, I'm so happy with the greatly enhanced sense of space and warmth of the new re-masterings over the old Blanton-Webster set that I don't mind--though it does seem that perhaps they should have made an exception in the case of "Jack the Bear."

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Re "groove squeak" -- John R. T. Davies told me that this was caused by the wax cooling during recording. He said that late-20s Victor recordings were especially prone to this problem. As to mitigating it, he said that sometimes he could choose the least noisy side of the groove, and other times resorted to the "judicious use of a notch filter".

[tatifan]

The notch filter is tough becuase the pitch of the whistle changes, especially if it's an off center pressing not quite compensated for, and this problem is most apparent at the ends of sides, where off centered effects are also the worst. Certainly a general roll off of the highs is no good......too much musicical info up there. I can live with the whistle, but then I've worked with 78s all my life.

Edited September 8, 2005 by tatifan

[Harold_Z]

I can live with the whistle too. Built in noise reduction. I think people who grew up when 78s were still around have that ability. Your just listening "elsewhere".

BTW - Unrelated to the whistle, but "Jack The Bear" doesn't particularly bother me. I hear what the fuss is about, but it just doesn't faze me. As Chuck Nessa pointed out, the noise is gone on the Centennial edition release.

[Teasing the Korean]

Bumping up an old thread.

My Ellington stuff from this era is spread over a variety of sources - French CDs, French LPs, US LPs, etc.

I just picked up the earlier 3-CD set - the one with the dark cover - because it had all the music conveniently in one place, and I couldn't pass it up at that price. Looking online, it seems that people have issues with the sound on both versions.

Anyway, I thought this version sounded fine, although I didn't do A/B comparisons with other collections. I haven't heard the newer 3-CD set, so I can't compare.

[J.A.W.]

Has anyone heard the reissue "Ko-Ko" on Dreyfus label?

about Ko-Ko

From the description it sounds like a lot of processing and noise reduction was done. Not usually a good thing, but perhaps in this case...?

I had two Ellington Dreyfus CDs but sold them - compared to my RCA CDs with the same material (including the centennial box) they sounded very unnatural and tampered with to me, with a lot of noise reduction.

[J.A.W.]

It's off topic, but re-reading this old thread I noticed quite a few members who seem to have left this board. Pity.

[Swinging Swede]

I think the new RCA box sounds A LOT better than the old one. There is clarity and detail where the old one was muddy and nonoised.

[J.A.W.]

I think the new RCA box sounds A LOT better than the old one. There is clarity and detail where the old one was muddy and nonoised.

If you're talking about the Never No Lament box versus the earlier Blanton-Webster Band set, I agree.

[Son-of-a-Weizen]

It's off topic, but re-reading this old thread I noticed quite a few members who seem to have left this board. Pity.

For some yes....but not all. Mnytime?? ...and wasn't that Pryan guy the one who ripped off several board members?

[J.A.W.]

It's off topic, but re-reading this old thread I noticed quite a few members who seem to have left this board. Pity.

For some yes....but not all. Mnytime?? ...and wasn't that Pryan guy the one who ripped off several board members?

Though some here didn't believe it, mnytime died years ago (got a message from his brother at the time) and yes, pryan ripped off others here.

[Teasing the Korean]

OK, so now I have both sets. I just got the set from 2003 or whatever and I've also had the one from 1986 or whatever. I A/B'd a few of the tracks and so far I think that both sets have their advantages and drawbacks. I'll have to devote more time to comparing. It is likely that I'll keep both, but honestly, if I had to unload one of them now, I'm not sure which I'd keep, based on the 4 tracks I compared. (Jack the Bear was one of them).

[Tom in RI]

This set has turned into a pricy item, $62 for a used copy, $150 for new at Amazon.

Nevermind, I see several other retailers have for a much more reasonable cost of just under $40 w/shipping.

Edited September 29, 2011 by Tom in RI

[colinmce]

Any reason not to be OK with the 80s edition?