“please Don’t Talk About Me When I'm Gone: The Search For Leon Redbone”,

Here is a great overview, in 58 individual tracks, of an important time in the life of one of the most important saxophonists in jazz. Lester Young (The Prez), was a genius of the music, spanning the shifting expression from the Swing years into Bebop, and becoming a pivotal figure in both. Yes, he was also persecuted and self-destructive, and plagued by mental and physical illness for most of his life, but his marvelous mind not only set the standard for generations of jazz saxophonists, but gave us an entire lexicon of hipster/beatnik language that has become part of American popular culture. Someone should make a movie about Lester Young.

Edmond Hall, James P. Johnson, Sidney De Paris, Vic Dickenson - The Complete Blue Note Sessions (1985) {4CD Mosaic rec 1941-52}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 883 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 628 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 186 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1941-52, 1985 Mosaic Records / Blue Note | MD4-109
Jazz / Early Jazz / New Orleans Jazz / Swing / Dixieland / Stride

To say that this limited-edition six-LP Mosaic box is overflowing with classics is an understatement. Included are a variety of small-group sessions (with overlapping personnel) from the early days of Blue Note. The Edmond Hall Celeste Quartet has five songs that are the only existing examples of Charlie Christian playing acoustic guitar; clarinetist Hall, Meade Lux Lewis (on celeste), and bassist Israel Crosby complete the unique group. The king of stride piano, James P. Johnson, is heard on eight solos; other combos are led by Johnson, Hall (who heads four groups in all), trumpeter Sidney DeParis, and trombonist Vic Dickenson (heard in a 1952 quartet with organist Bill Doggett).