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New Woody Herman Mosaic


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52 minutes ago, mjzee said:

Aren't these covered on the two recent Ellington boxes from Sony Legacy?

Not comprehensively.  Nearly all of the "albums" -- music originally issued on LPs -- have been reissued.  But the stuff released before the advent of LPs hasn't been reissued in a set since French Columbia did it a long time ago.  I think the set was available on CD for a minute. The 6-LP vinyl set is more readily available. (That's what I have. I'd jump at the opportunity to have it in digital format.)

Tons of great music tucked away in there. Paul Gonsalves' entry into the band. "Brown Betty." "The Sargent was Shy." "On a Turquoise Cloud." On and on. . .  

 

EDIT:
The second of three discs in this set is an excellent "sampler" of the 1947-52 period:

0001453432.jpg

If I get a hankering to hear this music and I'm not in my basement near my turntable, this is what I cue up. ;) 

 

Edited by HutchFan
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1 minute ago, JSngry said:

As the 70s The World Of Duke Ellington sets showed, Duke did a fair amount of singles and other one-offs for Columbia that never made it onto an "official" LP.

Yep.  That's the stuff. 

But, if I recall correctly, those World of DE sets were "electronically rechanneled for stereo" LPs.  :(  That's what makes the French vinyl preferable. 

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9 minutes ago, JSngry said:

As the 70s The World Of Duke Ellington sets showed, Duke did a fair amount of singles and other one-offs for Columbia that never made it onto an "official" LP.

I'm still waiting for a cd that contains "The Asphalt Jungle Twist". 

28 minutes ago, HutchFan said:

Not comprehensively.  All of the "albums" -- music originally issued on LPs -- have been reissued.  But the stuff released before the advent of LPs hasn't been reissued in a set since French Columbia did it a long time ago.  I think the set was available on CD for a minute. The 6-LP vinyl set is more readily available. (That's what I have. I'd jump at the opportunity to have it in digital format.) 

 

I'm not sure All American and Midnight in Paris have ever had an official CBS cd release.  

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24 minutes ago, medjuck said:

I'm still waiting for a cd that contains "The Asphalt Jungle Twist". 

I'm not sure All American and Midnight in Paris have ever had an official CBS cd release.  

I know that Midnight in Paris was briefly available on a French CBS CD.  

But -- to your larger point -- it would be great if these got the full Sony Legacy treatment. 

 

I just updated my post above to say "Nearly all of the 'albums'..."  ;) -- since I'd forgotten about "All American" in Jazz.

Edited by HutchFan
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37 minutes ago, HutchFan said:

Yep.  That's the stuff. 

But, if I recall correctly, those World of DE sets were "electronically rechanneled for stereo" LPs.  :(  That's what makes the French vinyl preferable. 

Fortunately, I did most of my listening to them in the days when the hifistereosystem had a mono switch.

To this day, "Kitty" is one of my alltimefavorite Duke cuts. Seriously.

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An interesting set.
I am a big Woody Herman fan but on looking closer i am rather unsure about it. As I see it, this begins with the Deccas AFTER the end of the recording ban, and I guess I have all the Deccas from that period on other reissues. As for the "rest", I once picked up a few stray LPs of the Woody Herman in Disco Order" LP series on Ajax (@gmonahan - now THIS is where the sound can get bad!  ;)) and am rather underwhelmed by many of the vocals that fill the gaps beyond the usual reissue fare. What I have on previous reissues from his Mars and MGM period is more spotty but still I wonder how much of the "remainders" or "new" tracks were first of all geared at those who like romantic vocals. I downloaded the track listing and will compare in due course.

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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49 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

An interesting set.
I am a big Woody Herman fan but on looking closer i am rather unsure about it. As I see it, this begins with the Deccas AFTER the end of the recording ban, and I guess I have all the Deccas from that period on other reissues. As for the "rest", I once picked up a few stray LPs of the Woody Herman in Disco Order" LP series on Ajax (@gmonahan - now THIS is where the sound can get bad!  ;)) and am rather underwhelmed by many of the vocals that fill the gaps beyond the usual reissue fare. What I have on previous reissues from his Mars and MGM period is more spotty but still I wonder how much of the "remainders" or "new" tracks were first of all geared at those who like romantic vocals. I downloaded the track listing and will compare in due course.

The discography for this set shows all the Deccas from the late 30s on. Responding to other questions, there are definitely reissue holes. The Japanese did reissue the fairly rare "New Swingin' Herman Herd" recorded in 1960 for Crown, but that one is not exactly popping off the shelves, and others have mentioned some Columbia stuff left out of various boxes. Mosaic issued a cd single of "Woody's Winners" from the mid-60s that also included some of "East-West," but one has to scramble to find some of Woody's mid-60s Columbias on cd.

And French CBS did issue the post-war Ellington Columbias on 5 cds as "The Complete Duke Ellington, 1947-52." That set included all the singles as well as the first Ellington LPs for the label.

 

 

gregmo

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9 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Did I miss something somewhere? The track listing that I downloaded starts with the Nov. 8, 1943 session.

Damn, you're right. I stand corrected!! Guess I'll have to hang on to that Decca GRP cd after all!

 

 

gregmo

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1 hour ago, gmonahan said:

And French CBS did issue the post-war Ellington Columbias on 5 cds as "The Complete Duke Ellington, 1947-52." That set included all the singles as well as the first Ellington LPs for the label.

gregmo

I know ... but I'm not old enoughto have been able to get that one.

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1 hour ago, mikeweil said:

I know there are offers around ... would end up around 100-120 bucks with shipping and taxes and custom fees, I guess. At that rate I'd prefer the Mosaic treatment (including the sessions to 1952, which at least in some cases on the long-players were programmed in various ways, thus the "album" concept is not beyond any doubt).

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I just saw the news about this new Mosaic release. Personally, I'm looking forward to it, both for the pre-1945 Deccas (the birth of the First Herd) and, hopefully, an improvement on the sound of the Carnegie Hall gig.

As for the Everests, for a minute there were a few reissues on the Empire Musicwerks label (distributed by Universal) around 2005. I seem to remember that at least one of them was a needle-drop, but I would really need to check.

F

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2 hours ago, king ubu said:

I know there are offers around ... would end up around 100-120 bucks with shipping and taxes and custom fees, I guess. At that rate I'd prefer the Mosaic treatment (including the sessions to 1952, which at least in some cases on the long-players were programmed in various ways, thus the "album" concept is not beyond any doubt).

For the same reason I keep my old French LP box set. It's all a question of how much you want it and how much you are willing to spend. :(

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Oh my...

Michael, you mentioned Woody on Fantasy earlier. Don't think there's a compilation or anything for that period of the band, but they made at least four albums for the label that were sort of yet another renaissance of the Woody Herman band making interesting, contemporary big band music in the traditional Herman format.

Presented for your consideration:

  • Brand New - the first Fantasy album, with guest guitarist Michael Bloomfield. I think most people like Bloomfield better than I do, and one chart featuring him his hopelessly hokey, but overall not a bad record.
  • The Raven Speaks - this is when the next Herd really finds its voice. May or may not sound a little dated today depening on how you respond to such things, but the arrangements of Alan Broadbent, Bill Stapleton, and Tony Klatka defined the sound of the band for the next few years. Still seems to be a crate-diggers favorite for some reason.
  • Giant Steps - really, really good - if you like the premise of woody Herman bands to begin with. I do, but not everybody does, especially as time goes by and younger ears aren't born into the whole lineage/evolution thing(s) like us older folks might have been.
  • Thundering Herd - personally, my favorite of the batch.

Here's a sampling:

 

my two most favorites here, jsut real gems of writing for the idiom:

Very possibly it was a "you had to be there" thing, but...I was, so there's that. Either way, the whole big band scene of the late 60s and early 70s was an interesting thing if, once again, you didn't reject the idiom out of hand to begin with. Woody was a little later getting there than some (although those Cadet records do what they set out to do better than their reputation suggests), but once he got there, he pretty much stayed there.

And if you ever wanted to know what Johnny Hodges might have sounded like playing Naima...maybe this, just for a second?

 

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Yes, the track I have is "Lazy Bird" from "Thundering Herd."  It was on a Fantasy OJC sampler (part of a great series, btw):

41T2PZDT4XL.jpg

But I don't want to derail the thread.

On Fantasy, looks like there were also King Cobra, Feelin' So Blue, Herd at Montreux, and Children of Lima.

And has anyone mentioned Concord?

41TE7R7KQ9L.jpg

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My go- to Herman is the stuff on the Columbia Mosaic and the Mosaic Select material, I do like the Cadet records and the Fantasy sides I mentioned (and to a dress Maze e's question about the remainder, they did not enthuse me the way the first ones did, but that might just as much been about me changing as it was the records themself).

This set will not be definitive or essential Herman, nor will it all be cut from the same cloth stylistically or commercially. Me, I'll get it before it goes OOP, but I. can't in good conscience suggest beginning an exploration of Woody Herman with this set. But if you think you might want to go there at some point, having this set handy ain't gonna hurt nothing, if you know what I mean.

was, that a long-winded enough answer? :g

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10 minutes ago, JSngry said:

My go- to Herman is the stuff on the Columbia Mosaic and the Mosaic Select material, I do like the Cadet records and the Fantasy sides I mentioned (and to a dress Maze e's question about the remainder, they did not enthuse me the way the first ones did, but that might just as much been about me changing as it was the records themself).

This set will not be definitive or essential Herman, nor will it all be cut from the same cloth stylistically or commercially. Me, I'll get it before it goes OOP, but I. can't in good conscience suggest beginning an exploration of Woody Herman with this set. But if you think you might want to go there at some point, having this set handy ain't gonna hurt nothing, if you know what I mean.

was, that a long-winded enough answer? :g

No, that was actually some rather high octane brevity, coming from you! ;) 

Seriously, though. Thanks for the breakdown. I still may spring for it, just cuz. But I’ll know to keep my expectations at a low simmer. 

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The thing about Woody's bands is that from jump, no matter what else was in the mix, fashion, vocals, economic necessities, there was always some genetic variety of this waiting to happen, just some rude-ass road dogs whose bite was at least the equal of their bark if they ever needed it to be. And they did often enough for me to always be curious about a Woody Herman record, just to see if this was gonna happen.

Even when he looking backward, very seldom did he look down, so yeah, gotta love that.

and just in case, Sal Nestico is a player worth knowing.

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