Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Classics of jazz, November 30, 2008
This review is from: The Best of Louis Armstrong: The Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings (Audio CD)
I'm giving this budget-priced CD-box 5 stars because it contains some of the most important recordings in the entire history of jazz:
Louis Armstrong's Hot Fives and Hot Sevens; the foundation on which Armstrong's reputation stands - at least if you ask jazz fans... Satchmo, Johnny Dodds, Earl Hines, Zutty Singleton and company (including the magnificent guest Lonnie Johnson on guitar) create some wonderful stuff and additional tracks by same artists in different settings is thrown in to make the cake richer (although some gigs - accompanying inferior singer f.i. - are not very uplifting).
However, although I have listened to this music in various forms for years (first on audio-tapes bought in Canada by my friend's father who sailed big cargo-ships), I must warn buyers who are NOT big jazz fans:
the bulk of this recordings is from the 20s, so don't expect any high fidelity there! There's also some hiss that is toned down in another attempt to transfer this treasure to CD ( The Hot Fives & Sevens)... That CD-box's page also has interesting discussions about different ways to transfer such old material.
Also, I'd like to warn jazz fans that this inexpensive box DOES NOT contain the precise listing of players and dates for each track - not a small fault by the distingue jazz-buff standards...
However, I already have that another (a bit more expensive) box of basically the same tracks, so I bought this one mostly to compare the remastering with this Columbia version...
The verdict? As someone has already said it - the remastering is DIFFERENT, but good in both cases.
At least on my inexpensive Hi-Fi equipment...
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
2.0 out of 5 stars
LOUIS DESERVES BETTER, August 28, 2011
This review is from: The Best of Louis Armstrong: The Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings (Audio CD)
Because of Amazon's confusing practice of cross-posting to what it calls "product groups", let me make it clear that this review relates solely to the Sony BMG 2008 4-CD set, with the green cover. This is a reissue of the first recordings Louis Armstrong made under his own name, plus eleven where his studio group provided the accompaniment to other vocalists. It runs from November 1925 to March 1929, and comprises 77 tracks, one a duplicate.
It's standard practice for such compilations to be ordered chronologically, not just for ease of reference, but also because the listener can trace the artistic development. It's also reasonable to expect a detailed tracklist, and a commentary on the individual recordings. This is the normal approach, which CBS followed in 1988/9, when producing several volumes in their Jazz Masterpieces series. Each volume was accompanied by a booklet which included a discography, setting out titles, personnel, recording dates, matrix nos. and the catalogue number of the original release, accompanied by John Chilton's informed commentary on the recordings.
The first problem with this set is that the chronology is all over the place. In date order, Disc One begins in November 1925 and concludes in November 1926, followed by Disc Three (to track 12, May 1927). We then revert to Disc Two which starts at September 1927, and runs to that December (track 9). Track 10 features a Butterbeans & Susie item from June 1926, and is followed by four Hociel Thomas vocals accompanied by the Hot 4, which date from November 1925. Disc Two concludes with an alternative Cornet Chop Suey (first featured as track 7 0n Disc One). After which the end of Disc Three features Lillie Delk Christian backed by the Hot Four on four numbers recorded on 26th June 1928, and finally Disc Four picks up from the following day and finishes in March 1929.
Such anachronistic treatment would be less of a problem if there were an accompanying booklet to act as a guide, but the gatefold insert comprises a mere eight pages (four backed up). One reproduces the cover and another publicises other releases in the series, and the tracklists, which are confined solely to titles and composers, take up just two pages. The reverse contains a meagre liner note, which deals quite peremptorily with the running order, and touches very briefly on the other vocalists' recordings.
As intimated earlier, two versions of "Cornet Chop Suey", an acoustic recording dating from February 1926, have been included. We're advised that the first version (which clocks in at 2:53) is in the key of F, but it sounds too fast. The second version (which clocks in at 3:13) is said to be in the key E flat ("which many scholars believe must be the likeliest key in which this was played"), but to my unscholarly ears it sounds too slow. The version as issued in the Columbia Jazz Masterworks series clocks in at 3:04, so I can't help feeling somewhat suspicious about the claim that Disc 2 contains the definitive version.
For all of those reasons I can't share the general euphoria that's been generated by this reissue, and my two star rating is directed not at the music, but at the shoddy manner in which it has been presented.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
5.0 out of 5 stars
Satchmo's Hot Five & Hot Seven Recordings, March 31, 2010
This review is from: The Best of Louis Armstrong: The Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings (Audio CD)
That title alone should be enough for any jazz fan to pick up this ridiculously affordable box set. While the liner notes are sparse, they do include some interesting information as to how these particular transfers came about. Supposedly this is the first set that the earlier recordings can be heard in the correct pitch. Whether that is true or not, I won't venture to guess, but this set does sound very good (although if you already have the JSP set, there isn't enough of a difference to justify replacing it). Two of my favorite tracks are on disc 2: "I'm Not Rough" & "Savoy Blues", mainly due to the superb guitar work of Lonnie Johnson who was perhaps the most overlooked and underrated guitarist of all time. He certainly belongs in any top five when you're listing the guitar greats of any genre. Other featured artists of note include Kid Ory (tb), Earl Hines (p) (a mainstay with Louis), Johnny Dodds (cl & as), Zutty Singleton (d) and some fine banjo playing by Johnny St. Cyr. Along with Pops, the other vocalists include his wife, Lillian Hardin, Hociel Thomas and Lillie Delk Christian. You won't confuse the female vocalists with Billie or Ella, but their sound was about par for the time. Also included is an excellent rendering of "St. James Infirmary" and "West End Blues". Of course all of the other material is classic and timeless, but those two songs in particular just seem to reach out and grab me. If you must have all track and session info, go for the JSP box, otherwise save some cash and pick this set up today. A jazz fan not owning this body of work would be like a blues fan not having Muddy's Chess sides or a classical fan not owning Beethoven's nine symphonies. Essential.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
|
