Woody Herman Complete

Vince Guaraldi was a well-respected jazz pianist whose greatest success came from avenues usually closed to contemporary jazz artists: he enjoyed a hit single at a time when jazz had largely been exiled from the pop charts, and he scored a series of very successful animated television specials (namely the Charlie Brown seasonal specials scores and soundtracks for which his name has become synonymous), a medium where cookie-cutter pop music was traditionally the order of the day.

Clarinetist Dave Bennett's Don't Be That Way is a throwback album, but it's not a carbon copy of what's come before. Bennett certainly finds inspiration in the work of past masters, driving down the highways and byways that have been paved by Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Woody Herman and others, but he's willing to look at their music with a fresh set of eyes; he's a centrist, but not a complete traditionalist. He'll occasionally throw a curve ball on a well-known tune, as demonstrated on the Brazilian-coated title track, but the ball always goes back over the plate in the end, locking in to some form of widely established and accepted practice.

Through the 1930s, Coleman Hawkins growth is exponential, especially in his ballad playing. Buttery warm and cozy, he finds notes that always work within the chord and are clearly there for anyone to find. But he's the one who finds them. And what is there to say about his solo on 1939's "Body and Soul" that hasn't already been said? This is the music that has proven so inspirational to generations of tenor saxophonists since; the endless possibility when taste and intelligence take on exceptional material. Our jam-packed set on eight CDs includes 190 tracks, 12 never before released. Included is material from Coleman's earliest days with Mamie Smith and her Jazz Hounds, his time with Henderson including various pseudonym bands and offshoots that shared personnel, the Mound City Blue Blowers, Benny Goodman's orchestra, Lionel Hampton, Benny Carter, Count Basie, co-leader sides with trumpeter Henry Red Allen, Cozy Cole, and a variety of all-star dates for Metronome, Leonard Feather, and Esquire, as well as recordings as a leader of his own dates. Our research has corrected many discrepancies in previous discographies.

Avid Jazz continues with its Four Classic album plus series with a re-mastered 2CD Second Set release from The Sauter-Finegan Orchestra, complete with original artwork and liner notes. “New Directions In Music”; “The Sons of Sauter-Finegan”; “Adventures In Time”, “Memories Of Goodman And Miller” plus “Concerto for Jazz Band and Symphony Orchestra”.
Eddie Sauter met Bill Finegan in 1939 when both men were making a living as arrangers for the likes of Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, Red Norvo and Woody Herman who were in fact most of the classic Swing Era leaders of the day! They had both started their musical careers as musicians, Finegan, a pianist and Sauter, a trumpeter…

In 1998, Collectors' Choice released Voices in Love/Love Lost, which contained two complete albums - Voices in Love (1958, originally released on Capitol) and Love Lost (1959, originally released on Capitol) - by the Four Freshmen on one compact disc.
The Four Freshmen were one of the top vocal groups of the 1950s, and formed the bridge between '40s ensembles like the Mel-Tones and harmony-based rock & roll bands such as the Beach Boys as well as groups like Spanky & Our Gang and the Manhattan Transfer…