Customer Reviews

From Battersea to Broadway

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I guess I'm probably just a fan of George's smooth later 50s & 60s sound, I think that material is just phenomenal. As for this box set: it includes a very informative booklet, but the sound quality is dull, not crisp at all and it just turned me off enough that I stuck my copy on eBay.

It was like listening to an AM radio broadcast & as excited as I was to get this, I didn't add it to my collection for long simply because of the sound quality, certainly not the performance. If you can get past this fact, it is a very good compilation of his early material (as early as 1939).

Yes, the recording is primitive compared to today's standards. That doesn't stop us from listening to Robert Johnson, does it? And the quality here is way beyond those seminal blues recordings. Maybe it's because I'm such a Shearing fan, but I love the heck out of this box set. The performances are wonderfully crisp and precise (what else would you expect from Shearing?) For the pittance that this set goes for (mine was $14 bucks plus shipping), it's worth many times more. I've got a ton of Shearing's recorded work, and I'm sure glad that I added this to the collection.