John L

I have always loved that first concert on the Mosaic box ever since I picked it up this LP when it came out in the 1970s. I was waiting for decades for it to finally be released on CD.

It is a distillation of the material on the Mosaic, which covers Brunswick and Columbia recordings from 1932-1940. There is nothing from RCA. The Ellington orchestra recorded almost exclusively for Brunswick and Columbia in the latter half of the 1930s.

While I concur with the other additional recommendations above, I think that the most glaring omission in your collection is the 1930s orchestra. I consider that to be some of the very greatest Duke Ellington. The best purchase that you could make, in my opinion (if you can find it), is the Mosaic 1932-1940 Brunswick / Columbia collection. That is a large and astounding collection of music that has almost no duplication with what you listed above. Chronological classics from this period is another way to go, although the sound quality is inferior, they duplicate the Mosaic small group set, and include a lot of secondary pop vocal tracks.

If Mosaic can't even make us happy with their service, the are not going to get anywhere with the general public.

Well, I have listened through the box already and it is pretty incredible. I was surprised at how little of this music I had previously. It turns out that the vast majority of my previous JATP recordings from this period were unofficial and therefore not even included on this set. I think that Mosaic is under-selling this set a bit in its advertisements. Most of this music is rare. Nothing much of it was ever released on CD with the exception of the Krupa/Rich Drum Battle and the Opera House recordings of Hawkins/Eldridge, Getz/J.J. Johnson and Ella Fitzgerald (A track was actually omitted from the Hawkins/Eldridge CD for space reasons that is restored here). Hell, there is some Pres and Bean here that is previously unreleased in any form! I seem to recall that Larry Kart posted here that he was at the September 1957 concert at the Chicago Opera House that included Lester Young, Sonny Stitt, and Illinois Jacquet. Interestingly, it would appear that the LP that was released as the "The JATP All-Stars At The Opera House" included music not from that concert but from a performance done one month later at the Shine in LA. This set presents the known music from both concerts, including previously unreleased performances from Chicago. I am VERY SATISFIED with this set. Bravo, Mosaic!

Almost like magic, after I wrote that post, I got a shipping notification.

For this pre-order, as well as my last one from Mosaic, I never even received any sort of confirmation about it. When I gave my credit card online a week ago, I just got a message that my order is "being reviewed." That is it. Last time I sent 5 emails to inquire about it that went unanswered. Client relations at Mosaic have really reached a low point.

Jim's original answer to the question with the Warne Marsh cover was a somewhat subtle but good one. It is much easier for a non-musician to recognize the changes of a standard when the soloist is playing around the melody as opposed to something completely different on the changes. I am speaking for myself, although I am not sure if I qualify as a "non-musician." I am not a professional but I do play music (mostly non-jazz). I can almost always recognize changes, including passing chords, although I certainly cannot always recognize what the changes were.

Joe Williams could ALSO sing great blues.

When I became a jazz fan in the mid-1970s, my biggest hope was that Monk would come again to the West Coast where I was living. It never happened.

There is no question about Monk's greatness as a composer. But I consider the unique way that Monk played music to be at least as great a legacy.

Pick this one up if you can still find it. If I could have only one blues disc, it would be disc 2 from this set. (It is not a selected compilation as the title might suggest but all of Muddy Waters' first recordings for Chess)

Yes. The closest thing that we have are the Billy Eckstine band recordings from 1944-1945. But Bird wasn't present on any of those.

That is a really fine session.

I saw him a few times in Paris toward the end of his life.

In an essay in on Miles Davis in "The All American Skin Game," Crouch writes a paragraph on the December 24, 1954 session, which mostly praises Thelonious Monk's contributions to the date. I have it in the 1996 anthology "Reading Jazz" edited by Robert Gottlieb. But maybe you have in mind a longer essay.

Or the Munich tracks?

This is great, Allen. I love it!

Peter Losin's online Charlie Parker discography would indicate that this tape was made by Chan Parker.

My soundtrack to growing up would have been very different without Thom Bell. RIP

Yes! This has quickly become one of my favorite Bird concerts, and Roy Haynes is one of the reasons.

I am really enjoying this immensely. Thanks for the link!

Wow! Some of this music was issued on the Bird's Eyes series. But nothing close to this 1 hour and 15 minutes. The fidelity here also appears to be a lot better. So it must be a different tape.

It is really hard to choose just one Jug album. But I would have a hard time parting with the early recordings he made for Chess. For certain moods, nothing can beat those low key Moodsville albums (Nice an' Cool, The Soulful Mood). Just even the way Jug plays the melodies of some of those ballads is soooooo satisfying.

This is a nice thread in reminding us how much fine jazz was recorded in the 1980s. That said, I can't help but feel that the 1980s were, comparatively speaking, a down time, and not only for jazz, in what was an extraordinary century for American music. More precisely, it may have been more the like late 70s-late 80s. Yes, there were Michael Jackson and Prince but... I find both the 1970s and 1990s to be stronger than the 1980s.