The Walking Dead (1940)

A chronological history of jazz vocal presented by André Francis and Jean Schwarz. 10 CDs with more than 12 hours of music.
The resulting 2 boxed sets of 10 CDs in each, unlike any other available today, groups together the main vocalists in the story of jazz from the first half of the 20th century. Each of these 20 CDs offers in more or less the same proportion, the purest of African-American song with gospel and blues singers, from truculent Ma Rainey to majestic Bessie Smith, sophisticated Sarah Vaughan to popular Louis Prima, the folk-related tones of Charlie Patton to the honeyed voice of Frank Sinatra.

This 10-CD set is as good a compendium of the genius of Louis Armstrong as anyone could wish for. It’s all here: the early years with the King Oliver and Fletcher Henderson bands, the glorious period of the Hot Fives and Sevens, the big band recordings of the Thirties, the collaborations with contemporaries such as Ella Fitzgerald. Then there are the later recordings, when Satchmo’s celebrity empowered him to soar over many political and racial divides. There’s also a fascinating unreleased Hollywood Bowl concert from 1956, a CD of “out-takes” from recording sessions, and a revealing interview with Dan Morgenstern.