Sarah Vaughan- The Complete Sarah Vaughan On Mercury.Vol.1- Great Jazz Years; 1954-1956 [6 CD, 1987]

 

Sarah Vaughan recorded extensively for Mercury/EmArcy during the 1950s and 1960s. Through much of that time, Vaughan's operatic voice was matched against overripe orchestrations or arrangements more suitable to a pop icon than one of the most versatile instruments in history. The exhaustive 4 CD box set overview of Vaughan's work with Mercury/EmArcy is essential only to completists or the most avid fans. Vol. 1, however, which collects material from 1954-1956 over six CDs, shows Vaughan at her best, including sessions with trumpeter Clifford Brown and drummer Roy Haynes. Most of the excellent performances from Swingin' Easy are included here.

James Moody - Just Moody [4 CD, 2005]

James Moody (March 26, 1925 – December 9, 2010) was an American jazz saxophone and flute player and very occasional vocalist, playing predominantly in the bebop and hard bop styles.

Moody had an unexpected hit with "Moody's Mood for Love," a 1952 song written by Eddie Jefferson that used as its melody an improvised solo that Moody had played on a 1949 recording of "I'm in the Mood for Love." Moody adopted the song as his own, recording it with Jefferson on his 1956 album Moody's Mood for Love and performing the song regularly in concert, often singing the vocals himself. 

Miles Davis - The Original Mono Recordings [9 CD, 2013]

 

The 2013 box set The Original Mono Recordings, brings together all nine of the albums the legendary jazz trumpeter recorded for Columbia that were originally released in mono, including 1957's 'Round About Midnight, 1957's Miles Ahead, 1958's Milestones, 1959's Jazz Track, 1959's Porgy and Bess, 1959's Kind of Blue, 1960's Sketches of Spain, 1961's Someday My Prince Will Come, and 1964's Miles & Monk at Newport. Remastered using the original master tapes and with pristine versions of the LPs as comparative benchmarks for sound, these mono versions have a warmth and immediacy that, at the very least, match the stereo versions, and to some ears may even outdo them.

Shorty Rogers - Creative West Coast Swing Featuring Art Pepper, Shelly Manne (1951-54) [4 CD, 2005]

 

Milton "Shorty" Rogers (born Milton Rajonsky; April 14, 1924 – November 7, 1994) was one of the principal creators of West Coast jazz. He played trumpet and flugelhorn and was in demand for his skills as an arranger. 

Coleman Hawkins - The Bebop Years 1939-1949 [4 CD, 2001]

 

Coleman Hawkins reached a new level of creativity during the 1940's. This box-set focuses on those yeard, presenting the original master of the tenor sax in a wide variety of settings, including his encounters with young modernists like Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk.

George Russell — The Complete Remastered Recordings On Black Saint & Soul Note [9 CD, 2010]

 

George Allen Russell was an American jazz pianist, composer and theorist. He is considered one of the first jazz musicians to contribute to general music theory with a theory of harmony based on Jazz rather than European music that was outlined in his textbook 'The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization.'

 This specially-priced set includes nine classic albums from Black Saint/Soul Note. Included are Electronic Sonata for Those Loved by Nature (I and II), Othello Ballet Suite, Vertical Form VI, Listen to the Silence, Trip to Prillarguri, New York Big Band, The Essence of George Russell and Live in an American Time Spiral.  

John Coltrane - Side Steps [5 CD, 2009]

 

John Coltrane's legendary Prestige recordings as a sideman to a host of jazz luminaries including Gene Ammons, Tadd Dameron, Red Garland, and Sonny Rollins.

Frank Sinatra – The Complete Reprise Studio Recordings [20 CD, 1995]

 

The Complete Reprise Studio Recordings is a 1995 box set album by the American singer Frank Sinatra. The release coincided with Sinatra's 80th birthday celebration.

The original 1995 packaging had the 20 discs encased in a small, leather-bound trunk. When it was re-released in 1998, it was repackaged in a more-standard (and cheaper) cardboard format.

As the title implies, the set claims to contain every song ever recorded in the studio during Sinatra's career with Reprise Records,but strangely misses the 49-second "I'm Getting Sentimental Over You (Reprise)" included as the closing track from the 1961 album I Remember Tommy and also leaves off a remake of "Body and Soul" and "Leave It All To Me" (a song written by Paul Anka), in addition to several alternate versions of songs included in the set. The set is the largest ever released for Sinatra to-date, containing 452 tracks on twenty compact discs.

Wardell Gray - The Wardell Gray Story [4 CD, 2003]

 

In keeping with high standards set by the U.K.'s Proper label, Proper Box 55 easily qualifies as the finest single-package anthology ever devoted to the works of tenor saxophonist Wardell Gray (1921-1955). His best recordings, which are well represented throughout this four-CD set, reveal the combined influences of Lester Young and Charlie Parker.

Curtis Fuller - Complete Blue Note / UA Sessions [3 CD,1996/FLAC]

 

Curtis DuBois Fuller (born in Detroit, December 15, 1934) is a United States hard bop trombonist, primarily known as a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers.

Trombonist Curtis Fuller, who developed his sound out of the style of J.J. Johnson, recorded prolifically as a leader from 1957-1962. After recording three dates for Prestige and New Jazz within a seven-day period in 1957, Fuller made four albums for Blue Note from 1957-1958, and after three albums for Savoy, he cut a lone session for United Artists in 1959. All of the five Blue Note and United Artists records (plus an alternate take of "Down Home") are on this excellent three-CD limited box set, released in 1996.