Stompin at the Savoy

I like both sides of Lou Donaldson. His bop soloing is fun and at times reaches greatness. His conception, ideas and technical ability to realize them. The soul jazz stuff is fun too, and even in his later stuff he still tends frequently to reach down inside and pull out some ferocious bop.

Some of the earlier recordings on the Lou Donaldson Mosaic still sound pretty boppish. Lou Takes Off, for ex.

There is some overlap between this discography and two euro-compilations I have: Oscar Peterson-The Classic Verve Albums and More Classic Verve Albums. I'm glad to have this new set coming! The Mosaic treatment is great: fidelity, mastering, book, photography, etc. I notice the price per disk has gone up a bit. Tempora mutantur nos et mutamur in illis

Thigpen's drums and Brown's bass are really nice and clear on the samples. Looking forward to this. Curious that they are only putting out 2500 of these. I guess they don't see much of a market?

I will order this. I enjoy OP.

Cast from Lost Boys musical.

Here's the booklet for the Complete Decca Sessions: https://musicbrainz.org/release/ba5d4236-388e-4dc8-9adf-ed38c4c08b69/cover-art . The set is sold as a (cd quality in some places) download under the name The Decca Singles. I got a complete copy of the box set on ebay in 2022 for $127.

Those Armstrong sets are kind of pricey right now, no idea why. But if you set up notifications on ebay, discogs, and what have you, and watch for a while you can generally get them for the original price ($15-$17 per disk), or less. For ex in 2022 I picked up #146 The Complete Decca Studio Recordings of Louis Armstrong and the All Stars, for $78 (box, book, the works, shipped). Two are available on spotify (and presumably as downloads from the usual sources): Louis Armstrong The Complete Louis Armstrong Decca Sessions (1935-1946): https://open.spotify.com/album/4ePSSZbkcek6jALbNtztI8? Louis Armstrong Columbia And RCA Victor Live Recordings Of Louis Armstrong And The All Stars: Vol. 1: https://open.spotify.com/album/7GwSrFicvM59OYCAFsDB4q Vol. 2: https://open.spotify.com/album/5oPUTne7UdDcLUsRKpODvW Vol. 3: https://open.spotify.com/album/6caWTu3uR6ykaFv1asaqwG

The lady has a great set of pipes. The arranger knows something about arranging. But somehow every time it starts to get going with a little jazz feel, it pulls up short and delivers cringey, artsy-fartsy schmaltz...

Binge watching Lolita Lobosco on PBS Passport.

From https://www.everythingjazz.com/story/the-tiberi-tapes-a-new-addition-to-john-coltranes-discography-for-2026/ The slow speed kind of explains the pitchy quality of the recordings. It often sounds to me like the speed is off and the pitch not standard. https://thumbs.worthpoint.com/zoom/images1/1/1225/17/vintage-magnavox-tr-100tape-recorder_1_d250f172475f7aa8e879a1a41bdb861b.jpg

There is some great playing in there but when the sax is playing the piano and drums are nearly inaudible. The recording level is probably too high and the sax distorts. There is some sort of clipping or distortion on the cymbals even when the sax is absent. The bass is pretty much nonexistent throughout. It's interesting but not really pleasant listening. Streaming it is fine for me - I can't see buying it because I would rather listen to other, well recorded performances of the same tunes from around the same time.

https://archive.org/details/18ShakeYourFeet There's a lot of interesting music from the 20's in these Chronologicals which is barely covered at all in the Study in Frustration collection. I like the use of baritone (bass?) sax as the bass instrument!