John Henry Jordan

The Alan Lomax Collection gathers together the American, European, and Caribbean field recordings, world music compilations, and ballad operas of writer, folklorist, and ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax. Deep River of Song: African-American field recordings made for the Library of Congress from 1933 to 1946, a transformative period when black singers of the South and the Caribbean created a new musical language and thousands of brilliant songs that would captivate people throughout the world.

Before there was the bluesman there was the songster and it was these travelling troubadours who helped lay the foundations for the development of the blues. In the decades preceding the phonograph and radio and before the American national entertainment industry had reached into the deepest parts of the South, it was these wandering musicians who provided the musical entertainment for all manner of social events. In order to be able to scrape a living together the songster had to be incredibly versatile and come up with something for everyone.

Before there was the bluesman there was the songster and it was these travelling troubadours who helped lay the foundations for the development of the blues. In the decades preceding the phonograph and radio and before the American national entertainment industry had reached into the deepest parts of the South, it was these wandering musicians who provided the musical entertainment for all manner of social events.

Boxer Joe Pendleton dies 50 years too soon due to a heavenly mistake, and is given a new life as a millionaire playboy.

Following previous reviews of this groundbreaking series I am running out of superlatives to use. It is the last of the planned sets, but I believe other recordings may follow. Set 7 contains six CDs, accompanied by extensive notes from blues historian Paul Oliver. There are some wonderful and memorable tracks on these final albums which bring the series to a fitting end.

Mosaic's newest box set, "The Complete Clifford Jordan Strata-East Sessions," bundles them all Jordan's sessions for the first time ever. It features 6 outstanding unreleased tracks, by Ed Blackwell with a drum ensemble and a quartet featuring Don Cherry. Collectively, the sessions are a microcosm of the jazz world in the 1970s, where the power was always on and the ideas were electrifying. Clifford Jordan was like a super-collider of old and new: his own session includes Don Cherry, Julian Priester, Richard Davis, Wynton Kelly, Wilbur Ware and Albert Heath on one date, Kenny Dorham, Ed Blackwell, and Roy Haynes with Kelly, Ware and Davis on another.

Highly regarded as Clifford Jordan’s most celebrated work, Glass Bead Games seamlessly blends hard-bop traditions with spiritual and avant-garde elements. Released by the highly influential Strata-East label, the album showcases Jordan’s technical mastery and emotional depth. Released in 1974, it features two alternating quartets anchored by Jordan and drummer Billy Higgins, with Cedar Walton and Stanley Cowell sharing piano duties and Sam Jones and Bill Lee alternating on bass. This collaborative lineup creates a dynamic yet cohesive album that reflects Jordan’s vision as a bandleader and his ability to push jazz into new territories while remaining deeply soulful.

This is a fan's dream. A monumental 2012 collection with all 59 albums that the legendary Johnny Cash released on Columbia from his arrival from Sun Records in 1958, until he was unceremoniously dropped by the label 28 years later. Additionally, it includes three bonus discs: "Johnny Cash With His Hot & Blue Guitar", which includes recordings from Cash's pre-Columbia period with Sun Records, and the two-disc "The Singles Plus", with singles Cash released on Columbia, plus Cash's guest appearances on other artist's albums. A great Christmas gift for all my Avax friends. Enjoy.

American Epic, a film series produced by Allison McGourty, Duke Erikson and Director Bernard MacMahon, explores the pivotal recording journeys at the height of the Roaring Twenties, when music scouts armed with cutting-edge recording technology captured the breadth of American music and discovered the artists that would shape our world.