Customer Reviews

Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra

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

 

 

Paul Whiteman is no Jelly Roll Morton but his orchestra was huge in the 1920's, playing every night at the Cocoanut Grove nightclub in Los Angeles. Amazingly, Whiteman's music has held up beautifully through the years and the musicianship displayed here is excellent. Whiteman is best known today as the man who gave Bing Crosby (then with the Rhythm Boys) his first big break, but the songs on this album don't feature Bing, just joyous Whiteman orchestral music. This is a time warp if there ever was one. For those of us born forty years after Whiteman was a hit, this gives us a taste of the Roaring 20's.

This outstanding Paul Whiteman collection consists mainly of "concert" pieces and arrangements from the 1920s and 1930s, all of them excellent and wholly deserving of reissue. Most noteworthy are Matty Malneck's wonderfully charming "Caprice Futuristic" from 1928, and Victor Herbert's "Suite of Serenades," originally written for Whiteman's 1924 "An Experiment in Modern Music," the famous concert that featured the premiere of George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue." Like "Rhapsody," these two pieces were orchestrated by "Grand Canyon Suite" composer Ferde Grofe.

Future "Some Like It Hot" song supervisor Matty Malneck is also represented by "Park Avenue Fantasy," the concert piece that yielded the popular song "Stairway To the Stars." And there is Peter DeRose's pre-pop-song concert version of "Deep Purple," another Whiteman commission.

The non-concert sides include "South Sea Isles," a very early George Gershwin tune in a very early Grofe arrangement, complete with musical quotes from Grieg and a great Dixieland-style ending, plus a joyous version of the DeSylva-Brown-Henderson classic, "It All Depends On You."

The label is to be praised for retaining the dynamic range of the original recordings through conservative noise suppression. The trade-off is a moderate level of surface noise, but the result more than justifies the means. These recordings sound great.

A "Volume II" is in order. Concert sides like "Soliloquy," "O Ya Ya," "Tchaikowskiana," and a host of others would make up a fine follow-up track list. Meanwhile, seriously consider this one!

Paul Whiteman is no Jelly Roll Morton but his orchestra was huge in the 1920's, playing every night at the Cocoanut Grove nightclub in Los Angeles. Amazingly, Whiteman's music has held up beautifully through the years and the musicianship displayed here is excellent. Whiteman is best known today as the man who gave Bing Crosby (then with the Rhythm Boys) his first big break, but the songs on this album don't feature Bing, just joyous Whiteman orchestral music. This is a time warp if there ever was one. For those of us born forty years after Whiteman was a hit, this gives us a taste of the Roaring 20's.

I am forty-two years old, but have been born much too late. The earliest part of the twentieth century is what I love and if you do too, then this marvelous music of Paul Whiteman will bring it alive! It has absolutely captivated me and made me want to go out and buy a cloche and some neck furs. Just so bouncy and danceable...and FAR superior to the detritus that passes for "music" today. There is some surface noise, but honestly the music is heard loud and clear over that and, at least for me, the surface scratches just fade out. I know nothing of recording processes, but those who do say that some of the musical aspects are lost in expurgating all the surface noise, which is undesirable in my opinion. I am new to Paul Whiteman , but after hearing this CD, I am getting everything he ever did! Buy it!!

This music, brought into the future, seems like today those who enjoy Mr. Whiteman's music are in a wonderful journey through time. Such hits as 'Whispering,''The Japanese Sandman,'and 'Nola' deserve high regards today (probably even more) than they were praised seventy years ago. I would even go beyond the 'four star'catagory, but yes, there is at least one or two songs that maybe could been avoided on the album's release. Thanks again for the great music Paul Whiteman.