Woody Shaw - The Complete CBS Studio Recordings (3 CD, 1992/FLAC)

 The bulk of Shaw's great sessions were recorded for independent labels (Muse & Contemporary,) ensuring them widespread critical evaluation but little audience except with the hardcore faithful. Things seemed about to change in the late '70s when Miles Davis suggested to Columbia that they record Shaw's group. They actually took his suggestion and signed Shaw. He issued a string of remarkable but low-selling records, and Columbia cut him loose after four years and four albums. They compounded the crime by deleting the records shortly after Shaw departed. Mosaic has corrected that slight with another of their marvelously produced and comprehensively notated and packaged box sets. This three-disc collection covers Shaw's Columbia sessions. While it is sad that Shaw's stay at Columbia was not more personally beneficial, it was quite musically productive.

Trumpeter Woody Shaw flourished when jazz didn`t, a pity for both. He found a steady, distinctive voice built on a set of coherent ideas new to his instrument and he offered them to an audience most interested in electronics and extremes.

Nonetheless, he was able to leave something behind when he died in 1989 after a long, painful physical and emotional slide. From 1977 to 1981 he recorded for CBS, and Mosaic Records has resurrected the work with care.

Some of it suffers the pretentiousness of the times (particularly the early pieces in the collection), but even they are models of restraint compared with what others were doing at the time. Most of the tunes are straight ahead and intriguing. It is good that Woody Shaw did not have to be totally forgotten before he was remembered.

Personnel: Woody Shaw (tp, flg), Joe Henderson (ts), Frank Wess (fl, picc), Curtis Fuller (tb), Art Webb (fl), James Vass (ss, as), Rene McLean (ss, ts), Carter Jefferson (ss, ts), Steve Turre (tb, b tb), Janice Robinson (tb), Onaje Allan Gumbs (p, elec p), Clint Houston (b), Victor Lewis (d), Sammy Figueroa (congas), Armen Halburian (perc), Lois Colin (harp), Mulgrew Miller (p), Stafford James (b), Tony Reedus (d) and others…

 

Curtis Amy - Mosaic Select 7 (3 CD, 2003/FLAC)

 

Relatively unknown as far as storming tenor players go, Texas-born Curtis Amy perhaps wasn't so storming after all, as this set suggests.

Familiar to rock fans for his solo on the Doors' "Touch Me, Amy was more restrained, more a player of shadings and touch, than his reputation and birthright might lead one to believe. These sessions for the Pacific Jazz label, all cut in the early '60s, open with two albums 

 

Andrew Hill discography [1963-2007]

Andrew Hill (June 30, 1931 – April 20, 2007) was an American jazz pianist and composer.

Hill is recognized as one of the most important innovators of jazz piano in the 1960s. His most-lauded work was recorded for Blue Note Records, spanning nearly a decade and a dozen albums.

 

Andrew Hill-(1963)-Black Fire {RVG Edition}

Andrew Hill-(1963)-Smoke Stack

Andrew Hill-(1964)-Andrew!!!

Andrew Hill-(1964)-Compulsion

Andrew Hill-(1964)-Judgment! {Blue Note-Japan}

Andrew Hill-(1964)-Point of Departure

Andrew Hill-(1965)-Pax

Andrew Hill-(1966)-Change {BN Connoisseur}

Andrew Hill-(1968)-Dance With Death

Andrew Hill-(1968)-Grass Roots

Andrew Hill-(1969)-Lift Every Voice

Andrew Hill-(1969)-Passing Ships

Andrew Hill-(1975)-Blue Black

Andrew Hill-(1975)-Divine Revelation

Andrew Hill-(1975)-One for One

Andrew Hill-(1975)-Spiral

Andrew Hill-(1976)-Nefertiti

Andrew Hill-(1980)-Strange Serenade

Andrew Hill-(1981)-Eternal Spirit

Andrew Hill-(1987)-Shades

Andrew Hill-(1987)-Verona Rag

Andrew Hill-(1990)-But Not Farewell

Andrew Hill-(1999)-Dusk

Andrew Hill-(2002)-A Beautiful Day

Andrew Hill-(2003)-The Day the World Stood Still

Andrew Hill-(2005)-Mosaic Select [3 CD]

Andrew Hill-(2006)-Time Lines

Andrew Hill-(2007)-Andrew Hill-Solo (3 CD, Mosaic)

Carmen McRae - The Singles & Albums Collection 1946-58 (4 CD, 2021)

 

Usually, when people start getting into the pioneers of modern jazz female vocalists, they begin with the triumvirate of Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan. For some reason, Carmen McRae (1922-94) gets overlooked these days, although at one time her patented behind-the-beat phrasing was the style most imitated by singers in her wake, most notably in ladies like Diana Krall. This four disc-97 song boxed set tries to get her name back in the upper echelon, where it belongs.

The collection includes singles from the late 40s to 50s, beginning with her stint with Mercer Ellington’s orchestra with a vibrant “Pass Me By”, and concluding her time with Decca singles with a big band with strings that features trumpeter Charlie Shavers with rich reads of “Invitation” and “Moonray”. Subsequently, included is her 1955 eponymous Bethlehem album, supported by Herbie Mann/fl, Tony Scott/p-cl, Mundell Lowe/g and Kenny Clarke/dr with irresistible reads of “Old Devil Moon” and “Easy To Love”. In 1956, her Decca album Torchy features her with orchestra and strings along with Joe Wilder/tp, Al Klink/ts for luscious versions of “Yesterdays” and “But Beautiful”, with McRae pouring her heart out. The same year, she delvered a small group beauty with Dick Katz/p, Wendell Marshall/b, Kenny Clarke/dr and Mundell Lowe/g, Herbie Mann/fl and Mat Mathews/acc for a bopping  “Yardbird Suite” and swaggering “Sometimes I’m Happy”. Two albums from 1957 have McRae backed by Jimmy Mundy’s orchestra for a collection of after late night ballads including “My Foolish Heart” and  “Lush Life”, contrasted with a swinging date with McRae at the piano alternating with Ronnell Bright with Specs Wright/dr and Ike Isaacs/b for riveting ballads such as “Guess Who I Saw Today” and bouncy swingers such as “Nice Work If You Can Get It”.

Bud Freeman - Chronological Classics 1928-1946 [4 CD/FLAC]

 Lawrence "Bud" Freeman (April 13, 1906 – March 15, 1991) was an American jazz musician, bandleader, and composer, known mainly for playing the tenor saxophone, but also able at the clarinet. He had a smooth and full tenor sax style with a heavy robust swing. He was one of the most influential and important jazz tenor saxophonists of the Big Band era. His major recordings were "The Eel", "Tillie's Downtown Now", "Crazeology", "The Buzzard", and "After Awhile", composed with Benny Goodman.

 

Verve Jazzclub - Legends [30 CD]

 

Universal/Verve music The JAZZ CLUB series adds an attractive budget line to the Verve catalogue. With its modern design and popular choice of repertoire, the JAZZ CLUB is not only opened for Jazz fans, but for everyone that loves good music

 

• Antonio Carlos Jobim - One Note Samba (2006)
• Astrud Gilberto - Non-Stop To Brazil (2006)
• Billie Holiday - Lady Sings The Blues (2006)
• Charlie Parker - Now's The Time (2008)
• Charly Antolini - Power Drummer (2007)
• Chick Corea - Electric Chick (2008)
• Connie Francis - Cocktail Connie (2009)
• Dizzy Gillespie - Live In Berlin (2006)
• Ella & Louis - Singing And Swinging Together (2011)
• Ella Fitzgerald - Live In San Francisco (2006)
• George Duke - Keyboard Giant (2007)
• George Shearing - Swinging In A Latin Mood (2006)
• Incognito - Always There (2010)
• James Brown - The Soul Brother's Jazz (2010)
• Jimmy Smith - Plays Red Hot Blues (2009)
• Klaus Doldinger - Shakin' The Blues (2008)
• Louis Armstrong - Let's Fall In Love (2006)
• Monty Alexander - Piano Genius (2012)
• Nat King Cole - Classic Recordings (2009)
• Oscar Peterson - Fly Me To The Moon (2006)
• Paco De Lucia - Flamenco Virtuoso (2008)
• Quincy Jones - Swinging The Big Band (2006)
• Roy Ayers - Soulful Vibes (2013)
• Sonny Rollins - Rollin' With Rollins (2012)
• Stan Getz - Body And Soul (2006)
• Stephane Grappelli - Tribute To Django Reinhardt (2009)
• Swingle Singers - Swinging The Classics (2009)
• The Andrews Sisters - Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen (2007)
• The Singers Unlimited - Feelings (2007)
• Wes Montgomery - Bumpin' On Sunset (2007)

Herbie Hancock - The Herbie Hancock Box (4 CD, 2002/FLAC)

Given that Blue Note Records has issued a definitive 1960s box set of Hancock’s earliest—and some consider his most seminal—work, and the literally dozens of best-of’s that have been issued, more by Columbia than by anybody else, this set with its spare futuristic design might at first glance seem like overkill, as in, “do we really need another Herbie Hancock collection, especially a damned box set?” In this case, it’s very important to take a second and even third look.

The material covered here encompasses a whopping 23 albums recorded over 13 years! There are 34 tracks spread out over these four discs, and while little here is completely unreleased, a number of cuts have never been made available in the States before. Lastly, given all of the Hancock material on the market, this set is the only one to capture the huge depth and breadth of Hancock’s musically restless vision as it has been recorded. The discs are not presented in chronological order, and that, too, is in keeping with Hancock’s modus operandi.

Disc one starts with the first V.S.O.P. project from 1976, which was the Miles quintet with Freddie Hubbard playing all new tunes, so you hear the introduction to “Maiden Voyage” and the track itself. Next, it shifts to 1979 with Hancock’s Live Under the Sky album, with a killer version of “Para Oriente,” and then shifts yet again to The Piano album in 1979, where Hancock plays a “Harvest Time” solo, before moving to “The Sorcerer” from the Quartet album of 1982. Before the disc has concluded, you’ve moved through more V.S.O.P., and the theme from the Round Midnight soundtrack.

Disc two offers more of these same treatments from the same periods generally, but it features a killer version of V.S.O.P. going for broke on a completely unreleased version of Freddie Hubbard’s “Red Clay” from 1977.

Disc three is nearly worth the price of the box alone. This is where you get to explore the electric side of Hancock, and the various guises he worked under from the time he immediately left Miles and worked with some musicians who were totally outside his frame of reference. For instance, there is the glorious “Rain Dance” from 1972, with a large band that included trombonist Julian Priester, synthesist Patrick Gleeson, and drummer Billy Hart. Also, along with more well-known classics such as “Watermelon Man,” from Head Hunters, you get tracks from Flood; Thrust; the killer Death Wish title theme with Wah Wah Watson and Lee Ritenour on guitars; “Sun Touch,” from Man-Child, featuring the most beautiful flute solo ever played by Ernie Watts; Secrets; Sunlight; and the outstanding “4 A.M.,” from the Mr. Hands album. This track, with a quartet that features the late Jaco Pastorius, Tony Williams, and percussionist Bill Summers, reveals the amazing depth of empathy Hancock had for the musicians he employed. His trading of lower runs with Jaco provides a listen to how tender Pastorius could be when presented with a keyboard player who was content to let him sing on the bass, and also how Hancock never has the need to dominate the proceedings, preferring to let the band speak for itself on his tunes.

Disc four also features Hancock’s more electric ventures. While the material ranges chronologically from “Chameleon” on Head Hunters to a Bill Laswell remake of “Maiden Voyage” in 1988, the sense of continuity that the rest of the box has doesn’t seem to flow as easily. The rather jarring juxtapositions of “Stars in Your Eyes,” from 1980’s Monster, to “Rockit,” in 1983, to “Calypso” from Mr. Hands in 1980, to “Nobu,” in 1974, is too vast an expanse—mood-wise as well as aesthetically—to bridge. Perhaps it’s the range of musicians that includes everyone from Ray Parker Jr. and Sheila E to Harvey Mason and Tony Williams, just to name a few. While the individual bands add up to pure delight, the track-to-track moves atmospheres, even in the funk-hip-hop worldview from bumpin’ street funk to jagged, angular grooves, to near-overdriven bass, and time-lines that obliterate continuity.
In all, this is a small complaint; doubtless, many will use the random feature on a CD player to remedy this, or the programming feature. The Herbie Hancock Box does stand as a more than representative view of the musician’s work with Columbia and reveals how lasting and influential his contributions have been, as well as how diverse, and that’s really the point. Hours upon hours of pleasure await the listener who drops the cash for this fine artifact.

DISC ONE (01:12:44)

01. Introduction to Maiden Voyage (Herbie Hancock) 04:33

02. Maiden Voyage (Herbie Hancock) 13:21

03. Para Oriente [live, feat. The V.S.O.P. Quintet] (Tony Williams) 07:16

04. Harvest Time (Herbie Hancock) 04:49

05. The Sorcerer (Herbie Hancock) 07:19

06. Diana [live, feat. The V.S.O.P. Quintet] (Wayne Shorter) 04:34

07. Finger Painting [feat. The V.S.O.P. Quintet] (Herbie Hancock) 06:45

08. ’Round Midnight [feat. Bobby McFerrin] (Bernie Hanighen / Thelonious Monk / Cootie Williams) 05:36

09. The Eye of the Hurricane (Herbie Hancock) 18:32

DISC TWO (01:09:17)

01. Domo (Herbie Hancock) 12:24

02. Dolphin Dance (Herbie Hancock) 10:18

03. Liza (All the Clouds’ll Roll Away) (George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin / Gus Kahn) 08:52

04. Eighty-One (Ron Carter / Miles Davis) 13:03

05. Milestones (Miles Davis) 06:39

06. Stella by Starlight-On Green Dolphin Street (Bronislaw Kaper / Ned Washington / Victor Young) 07:06

07. Red Clay (Freddie Hubbard) 10:55

DISC THREE (01:07:50)

01. Rain Dance (Herbie Hancock) 09:17

02. Watermelon Man (Herbie Hancock) 06:30

03. Butterfly (Herbie Hancock / Bennie Maupin) 11:19

04. Death Wish (Main Title) (Herbie Hancock) 06:12

05. Actual Proof (Herbie Hancock) 08:28

06. Sun Touch (Herbie Hancock) 05:09

07. 4 A.M. (Herbie Hancock) 05:23

08. Come Running to Me (Herbie Hancock / Allee Willis) 08:25

09. People Music (Herbie Hancock / Paul Jackson / Melvin Ragin) 07:08

DISC FOUR (01:07:58)

01. Chameleon (Herbie Hancock / Paul Jackson / Bennie Maupin / Harvey Mason, Sr.) 15:41

02. Stars in Your Eyes (Lisa Capuano / Gavin Christopher / Herbie Hancock / Ray Parker, Jr.) 07:05

03. Rockit (Michael Beinhorn / Herbie Hancock / Bill Laswell) 05:26

04. Calypso (Herbie Hancock) 06:43

05. Satisfied with Love (Herbie Hancock / Jean Hancock) 06:31

06. Karabali (Herbie Hancock / Daniel Ponce) 05:16

07. Spider (Herbie Hancock / Paul Jackson / Melvin Ragin) 07:21

08. Nobu (Herbie Hancock) 07:23

09. Maiden Voyager / P. Bop (Leroy “Sugarfoot” Bonner / Bootsy Collins / Herbie Hancock / Bill Laswell) 06:33 

Freddie Slack - Mosaic Select 18 (3 CD, 2005/FLAC)

 Freddie Slack was the pianist with Jimmy Dorsey's orchestra during part of the 1930s before becoming well known for playing boogie-woogie with Will Bradley's band, most notably on the hit "Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar."

 In 1941 Slack went out on his own, forming a big band that soon signed with the Capitol label. His hit recording of "Cow Cow Boogie" in 1942 with singer Ella Mae Morse made him famous even though none of his other records caught on at the same level. Slack's orchestra just lasted two years and, although he had a new band during 1945-1946, many of his recordings were made with small groups. With the exception of a slightly earlier four-song session for Decca, five songs that were purposely bypassed, and a 1955 album of boogie-woogie and re-creations, all of Slack's recordings as a leader are on this three-CD set. 

There are 17 previously unreleased performances, including a five-song session from 1946 and three numbers from 1952. It is particularly interesting to hear the influence of bebop being felt in Slack's playing and some of the arrangements although he mostly remained a swing stylist. While most of his sidemen are little known, T-Bone Walker pops up on a few numbers (including two features), guitarists Remo Palmieri, Al Hendrickson, and Tiny Timbrell are assets, and every vocal by Ella Mae Morse is well worth hearing. In addition, Johnny Mercer is a guest on several tunes. The three-fer is wrapped up by all seven recordings by drummer Ray McKinley's long-forgotten 1942 big band, a band with trumpeters Dick Cathcart and Pete Candoli, valve trombonist Brad Gowans, clarinetist Mahlon Clark, and pianist Lou Stein in the personnel. Overall, this is a well-conceived release of mostly obscure but worthy music.

 

Charles Mingus - The Complete Debut Recordings [12 CD, 1990]

 

This mammoth 12-CD box set may not contain Charles Mingus' most significant recordings (those would take place shortly after these sessions), but there is a remarkable amount of exciting and somewhat innovative music in this reissue of all of the dates recorded for Mingus' Debut label. There are duets and trios with pianist Spaulding Givens, a variety of odd third stream originals (some with vocalist Jackie Paris and altoist Lee Konitz), the famous Massey Hall concert with Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie (heard in two versions, one with Mingus' overdubbed bass), a four-trombone date with J.J. Johnson, Kai Winding, Bennie Green, and Willie Dennis, trio sets with pianists Paul Bley, Hazel Scott, and the obscure John Dennis, a quintet with trumpeter Thad Jones and Frank Wess on tenor and flute, Miles Davis' "Alone Together" session, a date led by trombonist Jimmy Knepper, a completely unissued 1957 sextet session, and -- most importantly -- a greatly expanded live session with trombonist Eddie Bert and tenor saxophonist George Barrow that found Mingus finally finding himself musically. Many of these performances are now also available in smaller sets, but this attractive box (which has 64 previously unissued tracks among the 169 selections) is the best way to acquire this valuable music.

Bugge Wesseltoft - New Conceptions of Jazz Box (3 CD, 2009/FLAC)

 

While the Norwegian jazz scene has been pursuing its own course for decades, the period of 1996-1997 represented a significant watershed, a milestone where an entirely new kind of music emerged, linked to jazz but distanced considerably—some might say completely, but they'd be mistaken—from its roots in the American tradition. Three seminal and groundbreaking albums were released within a year of each other: trumpeter Nils Petter Molvær's Khmer (ECM, 1997); noise improv group Supersilent's 1- 3 (Rune Grammofon, 1997); and, beating the others by a year, keyboardist Bugge Wesseltoft's aptly titled New Conception of Jazz (Jazzland, 1996). All three explored the integration of electronics, disparate cultural references, programming, turntables and—especially in the case of Supersilent, the most avant-garde of the three— noise, to create aural landscapes that were innovative, otherworldly and refreshingly new. The three releases created a unified shot across the bow that announced, in no uncertain terms, that something new was happening, something was changing, and that jazz and improvised music would never be the same again.

Of the three releases, New Conception of Jazz was, perhaps, the most user-friendly; a combination of dance floor beats, relentless grooves and solos couched within, at times, accessible but almost subversively challenging changes, Wesseltoft's "New Conception of Jazz" (NCOJ) became an imprint that spawned a series of albums— Sharing (1998), Moving (2001), Live (2003) and Film Ing (2004), all on the keyboardist's burgeoning Jazzland label. Over the course of these albums, Wesseltoft gradually expanded the purview of his NCOJ. While the electronica-drenched grooves of songs like "Somewhere in Between" and "Change" may have mistakenly pigeonholed Wesseltoft's music as sacrilegious to the jazz police, looking under the covers revealed an unmistakable sound that was, at least in part, influenced by pianist and icon Herbie Hancock's electric music—Head Hunters (Columbia, 1973) updated, perhaps, for an approaching and ultimately occurring new millennium.

But NCOJ was always about something more, and New Conception of Jazz Box—a generous three-CD set, with an additional DVD that features a NCOJ collaboration with oudist/vocalist Dhafer Youssef at Montreux in 2004—demonstrates just how much. It not only sets the record straight on the diversity of the concept, but positions Wesseltoft—alongside Norwegians contemporaries including fellow keyboardists Christian Wallumrød and Ståle Storløkken, trumpeters Molvær and Arve Henriksen, guitarist Eivind Aarset, drummers Audun Kleive and Thomas Strønen, singer Sidsel Endresen and turntablist Pål "DJ Strangefruit" Nyhus—as an artist who has gained considerable cachet everywhere but, curiously, the United States. It's time for that to change.