Customer Reviews

Concepts

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This box set contains what I believe to be the absolute summit of American popular music. The featured artist sang unfathomably deep interpretations of popular tunes written by America's greatest popular songwriters & lyricists, orchestrated by brilliant popular music arrangers and produced with enormous craftsmanship by the dedicated engineers and technicians of a first-rate record company. The music in this collection is almost certainly well known to everyone reading this review. Therefore, I will concentrate on specific technical issues. What are the technical qualifications mentioned in the title line of this review?

As a huge Sinatra fan, particularly of his Capitol era recordings, I have collected all of the Capitol "concept" albums in the following forms:

1. Early CD re-issues ( c. 1987 ) individually

2. Original "CONCEPTS" box set from 1992 ( containing the same 1987 CD reissues in one package ).

3. 20-BIT re-mastered versions of all albums that have been released to date ( 1998-2000 ).

4. An imported 21 CD ( England ) set of the Capitol recordings titled "THE CAPITOL YEARS".

My findings are that the 20-BIT re-mastered versions of SOME of the albums have muddied their quality and definition. For me, the "muddied" recordings are the albums from 1953 thru 1956. However, all have tolerable if unspectacular sound except for one album. "SONGS FOR SWINGIN' LOVERS" is the one unmitigated disaster. The problem is a sort of "compression" that dampens ( flattens ) the sound of the band, pushing it to the background and over-emphasizes Frank's voice ( puts in the foreground ). It sounds almost as if he's singing to pre-recorded arrangements ( which of course he wasn't; he always sang LIVE with the band during the recording sessions in the 1950's and 1960's ). This is a serious matter and NOT primarily for monetary reasons (cost is obviously a factor to people interested in coughing up for an expensive set like this ). Frank Sinatra's music from the Capitol era is sacred for millions of people and for there to be this type of error in the re-mastering process is quite a concern. The British did a FAR better job of re-mastering the Capitol era material on the import box mentioned above ( "THE CAPITOL YEARS", available through AMAZON.CO.UK ). The clarity achieved by the British re-masters allows the listener to hear a perfect balance between voice and orchestra; it really is a dramatic improvement over all other versions. And, to top it off, the cost of that import is just about equal to the new "CONCEPTS" release despite the fact the British box contains all of the "concept" albums ( minus the Christmas album ) AND the singles releases! Unlike the "CONCEPTS" release being reviewed, where the albums have the "bonus cuts" following the original songs in the original order, the British set PRESERVES the original order, which is much more aesthetically satisfying than having "bonus cuts" intruding on the mood of albums very carefully planned by Mr. Sinatra himself to convey such moods ( that is the point of the "concept" album ). The bonus cuts on the British set are contained on the "best of" albums like "THIS IS SINATRA".

POSITIVE POINTS ABOUT THE NEW BOX SET:

1. The rest of the re-mastered albums featured ( ie, virtually all recordings from 1957 on ) have, in general, good quality sound ( again however, the sound is easily surpassed by the English import box set ).

2. Several albums are featured that hadn't been 20-BIT re-mastered heretofore:

"CLOSE TO YOU" ( 1956 ) In the top 5 of all time greatest Sinatra albums ( arr by Nelson Riddle ). Previously out of print.

"WHERE ARE YOU?", (1957) / "NO ONE CARES" ( 1959 ). Two classics arranged by Gordon Jenkins.

"NICE N EASY" ( 1960 ) One of the most popular Sinatra LP's and deservedly so ( Nelson Riddle, arr )

"COME SWING WITH ME" ( 1961 ) Great Billy May all-brass ( no saxophones ) arrangements for up tempo swingers.

"POINT OF NO RETURN" ( 1962 ). Beautiful orchestrations by Axel Stordahl; an elegiac farewell ( for Axel and Frank's Capitol era )

3. The packaging and notes are attractive and very nicely produced; the best I've seen of all of the Sinatra box sets. Will Friedwald's essay is as good as one would expect from a man who wrote the definitive book on Frank Sinatra's music ( "SINATRA: A SINGER'S ART" ). Pete Welding's notes on each of the albums are very informative, well written and thankfully, of some length.

4. All instrumental ( Sinatra conducted ) rarity entitled "TONE POEMS OF COLOR" ( 1956 ).

5.The cost of this new version of "CONCEPTS" is reasonable; a lot less than the previous box set version released in 1992.

MINOR GRIPES:

1.At least 50% of the photos in the lavish booklet have been captioned with the wrong dates.

2.The back side of the box is marred by the lengthwise paper listing the albums contents and attached to the box with rubber cement. It's very hard to remove this sticky stuff! This was a ridiculous move on the part of Capitol that should NEVER have been allowed to stain an expensive deluxe package!

CONCLUSION:

I have no regrets about purchasing this box set, given the positive points I listed towards the latter part of my review. Then again, I have a collector's mindset and someone looking to be economical ought to investigate the sound on an INDIVIDUAL copy of one of the 20-BIT re-mastered copies. If after listening to it yourself, you think the sound is just fine and wonder what the heck I was thinking, then by all means purchase this set with a clear conscience.

Needless to say, the musical content of the set is priceless and will continue to be treasured by generations of people to come.

Very happy to have all the Capitol albums in a aesthetically pleasing collection, almost identical to match the Reprise set I have. I do question the quality of the digital remastering, especially "Songs For Swinging Lovers" (disc 3) sounds muffled and lacks the range of the gold disc Mobile Fidelity released several years back of the same title. Would have expected at least that same quality for a set of this stature and price. Other discs sound much better, even stunning or as good as you would expect. Just think someone was asleep when they transfered "Songs For Swinging Lovers" which is widely considered to be the most prominent and popular album Sinatra did during these Capitol years!!! Especially surprising because the sound engineer credited for this set has done some awesome work for Capitol relases of this vintage (Ultra-Lounge collection for example). But don't let this deter you from buying this set. If you want to splurge, it is still worth every penny.

I have owned every big box set that has been issued by the three record companies Mr. S worked for as a solo artist. These include Columbia's Complete Recordings, the British Capitol 21 cd set The Capitol Years, the 20 cd Complete Reprise Studio Recordings, and the subject of this review Capitol Records CONCEPTS, which is a 16 cd set containing 17 original albums
that Sinatra released during his years at Capitol (1953- 1962 ).This set includes one instrumental only album(Tone Poems of Color) and 16 vocal albums(2 being included on one cd).It can be legitimately argued that the Capitol years were the acme of Sinatra's career and these albums prove that fact.
The British box set The Capitol Years, was issued in 1998 and consists of 21 cd's, including 5 singles compilations and one Rarities disc. The sound is 20 bit remastered from 2nd generation lp masters, and the sound is impressive, but NOT as good as this box set, which was 24 bit remastered from Original Master Tapes by Bob Norberg, who is something of a legend for his fine work in restoring the original brilliance to older recordings.His work on this set is monumental, and infinitely better than the set of 20 bit remasters that Capitol did in 1998 for the individual reissues of half of the albums on this set.When I listen to these recordings Sinatra sounds fabulous, and the bass lines and orchestral textures are beautifully done. These cd's sound like the original lp's but even better. The British set sounds fine, until you compare recordings with this set. Bass lines are fuzzy and everything sounds rather thin and shrill, maybe because the master tapes used were from digital masters done in 1984, when cd sound was NOT so true to life as it is today.
The large hardcover booklet that comes with this set is drop dead gorgeous and very informative, the only caveat being that many of the great pictures are miscaptioned. The Will Friedwald essay is fascinating and informative and all of the original cd liner notes are included.
The box is superbly designed and the whole package is extremely attractive. My advice is to seek this box set out (yes you can find bargains on the price) and buy it ASAP before it becomes unavailable. It will be the best musical investment you could ever make.

There seems to be some confusion as to whether this box duplicates the generally awful 1998 20-bit "Entertainer of the Century" single-disc reissues. After hearing the box, there appears to have been some subtle tweaking vis-a-vis the earlier releases. Still, if you don't listen critically, or if your system is not extremely analytical, this may be a distinction without a difference.

Some effort has apparently been made by Bob Norberg to bring these transfers closer to the master tapes. Accordingly, there seems to be somewhat less added reverberation than in many of the 20-bit discs, and what sounds like less (or at least more discreetly-applied) noise reduction . This pays particular benefits in the case of a soft, intimate album like "In the Wee Small Hours," which comes up stunningly close-up and immediate in this box. Still, there is an attempt in most cases to eliminate hiss, and the top end--particularly noticeable in the stereo albums--lacks some of the sparkle it should have.

It's true that "Songs For Swingin' Lovers" (ironically the greatest of Sinatra's Capitol work, and probably the best album of his career) continues to have problematic sound: there appears to have been some deterioration of the master tapes, which manifests itself as an treble-attenuated, plastic-y sound to the brass; this was not evident, for example, on the original 1987 CD. On the other hand, the transfer in the Concepts set appears to be slightly impoved over that on the single EOTC disc. There is still some out-of-phase "stereo" information to give the mono sound a bit of spread; this is far more apparent in headphone listening, and I found it not at all bothersome on speakers. All in all, SFSL still doesn't sound great, but my feeling is that Norberg felt the advantages of going back to the studio masters outweighed any drawbacks. Or perhaps the original masters are lost or hopelessly damaged.

Norberg means well, but I occasionally get the sense that this remastering engineer doesn't feel he's earning his salary unless he's for heaven's sake doing something. Norberg's interventionist philosophy may be too much of a good thing for more purist tastes. These were by and large beautifully-recorded sessions, and he should have left them alone.

This box set contains 16 separate (single CD) recordings that Frank Sinatra cut for Capitol from 1953 to 1961. Note that none of these CD's is in the "20 bit remastered" format, which is an ongoing re-release project (started in 1998) chronicling the Capitol and Reprise eras. However, if there are any passionate Sinatra fans who either haven't upgraded from LP to CD, or only have a few cd's, I could recommend this set wholeheartedly. It has all the classic "concept" recordings ( "WEE SMALL HOURS", "SONGS FOR SWINGIN' LOVERS", "ONLY THE LONELY", etc ) hence the title of the box set, "CONCEPTS". Included is a masterpiece entitled "CLOSE TO YOU" (1956) which I am flabbergasted to report is currently unavailable in any other (CD) format other than this package. This is one of the top 6 Sinatra recordings of all time in my opinion; a stunningly beautiful ballad album arranged for string quartet and small ensemble by Nelson Riddle. To sum up the entire set- it contains music that is "high art" ( no matter how "popular" it has become ) and it will no doubt continue to move people for a long, long time. Maybe you will be one of those people.

I bought this collection of Sinatra for my 90 year old blind father. It has brought back so many memories for him: I have heard stories about the courtship of him and mom, stories of his military service, and many more stories about his life . . . all sparked by hearing "Blue Eyes" sing a certain song. A family friend came over and upon hearing some of the music, told a story of going into NYC on the subway when she was 11 years old to see Sinatra perform live. In reliving some of these memories, I have been able to glean some very key information in my geneology research. I'm so glad I got this set for dad.

This is an absolutely gorgeous collection of Sinatra's Capitol albums across 16 CDs, all in chronological order and lovingly remastered to 24 bits resolution by Bob Norberg at Capitol Mastering - the same dedicated and talented Engineer who is also entrusted with remastering Capitol's Nat King Cole back catalogue for CD.

This is the best sounding complete collection of Sinatra's Capitol output currently available on CD - having been sourced directly from the Capitol Master Tapes....the U.K. Capitol Collection is it's nearest rival - but that was sourced from 'Dubbed Masters' sent to Abbey Road and mastered to 20 bits resolution....I own both sets and can confidently say that closely comparing the two, the Concepts release offers a definite upgrade in sound quality, Sinatra's voice has a far more rich and believable timbre and rests in a Studio space that has real depth, allowing his vocals to decay more naturally after each phrased line - the sound of the session musicians have much better clarity too, without any harshness to the brass sections or strings.

The set comes complete with a fully illustrated & annotated 96 page hard-backed book which contains lots of rare photos and detailed first-hand essays from friends and engineers who worked with Sinatra whilst he was with Capitol records....The only downside is that it's a very Limited release in this format....So if you can find one, BUY ONE!

In short, every disc in this collection is great. Sinatra was at his best at Capitol Records and the best Sinatra stands along with the best music of the 20th century. A pity, then, that some of the titles in this box are only available in this box and not in "single disc" form. .... As reviews for the readily available single titles like "Songs for Swingin' Lovers" and "Sings for Only the Lonely" are available elsewhere on this site, I'll concentrate on the "available only in this box" titles.

"Close To You and More" is the most unique in it's arrangments with Sinatra being backed only by a string quartet. This makes this Riddle-arranged ballad-only album the most intimate-sounding of all Sinatra titles with some of his most lovely, nuanced vocals. Arranger Gordon Jenkins provides lush string sections for Sinatra on the lost-love albums "Where Are You?" and "No One Cares," which are more theatrical and grandiose than other ballad albums. Jenkins albums are a bit "straighter" and less witty and urbane in their arrangements, preferring to conjure up a heightened sense of drama. The Bill May-arranged "Come Swing With Me" is a fantastic, brawny all-brass album which more than holds it's own with the most aggressive swing Sinatra recorded. "Point of No Return" reunites Sinatra with his Columbia-era arranger Axel Stordahl (sp?) and is perhaps his most underrated ballad album, with several outstanding moments ("September Song") and arrangements which are as good or better than Riddle's ballad work for SInatra. Riddle's "Nice N Easy" is a fine collection of ballad remakes of Columbia-era material and, while perhaps not as bracing as other Riddle efforts, is a fine, laid-back collection. Finally, "Conducts Tone Poems of Color" is an all-instrumental curio on which Sinatra conducts only. It comes off like typical film score music from the '50s - not great but not bad either.

Get this set and don't let "Close To You & More," "Come Swing With Me," "Point of No Return," "Nice N Easy," "No One Cares," and "Where Are You?" pass you by!

For me, it began years ago when I bought the abridged, "best of" compilations from each of his label periods. After awhile, what I had wasn't enough, and I have since forked out the cash for his Columbia (wood) box, and now this beauty, "Concepts". For those like me years ago, you simply have no idea what an embarrassment of riches is to be found inside this masterfully crafted box. Disc after disc of amazing work from one of the all-time legends, you will not believe your ears it is all so amazing. Now, I cannot speak to the issue of whether the sound quality is as good as it should be according to some of the other reviews for this, but it seems like a few titles seem to be missing some sonic "ooomph". Overall, I cannot complain too harshly. It's worth every penny. Buy one before they sell out, you won't regret it.

I recently have started to collect Frank's music. I have decided to work backwards from his Reprise years back to his Dorsey days. I saw the price on this set at several retailers for well over 225, but Amazon has an amazing sale on it right now, so my girlfriend bought it for me as a gift.

When I got the set, I remember reading that the set was no longer the 16 individual albums but now in slip cases. Thats what I got. It is a gorgeous set with a very nice hard bound book and the CDs in well made slip cases. My gripe about the set though it that its very hard to get the CD books out of the main box, as they get stuck in there.

The music is too good for words. Sinatra's Reprise years had some great music and some terrible music all mixed up. Not his Capitol recordings, they are all just amazing. Others on Amazon have mentioned that some of the songs overemphasize Sinatra's voice and I can definately see what they mean. When these discs are played on my high-end audio system in the house, this is very noticeable. When played in the car or on the computer, its not as much so. It is a good transfer of the music though, with no major problems.

All in all, well worth the green. If your considering this set (as I was for a while), the current Amazon price is the one to go for!