The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

gramophone-georg wrote:

marcapra wrote:I would add Artie Shaw's Traffic Jam (really hot swing), and his Lady Be Good.
His Concerto for Clarinet is good too on 12". I like Ellington's jazz symphony Black, Brown, and Beige on two 12" Victors. For Charlie Barnet, besides Cherokee Redskin Rhumba is a must. For Woody Herman, I like his Ebony Concerto by Stravinsky on Everest LP, or probably a Columbia 78 12".

Yes, forgot about Traffic Jam. Good one! The flip side, "Serenade To A Savage" is no slouch, either.

A common A. Shaw Bluebird, yes. That was when Buddy Rich was on the band. Savage is a driving tune.

Billie Holiday's Lover Man / That Ole Devil Called Love on Decca is fairly common.

bfinan11 wrote:I would add Bunny Berigan to this list, and while nowhere near as common as Bing, Bob Crosby.

And in this era at least, unlike today's music, I wouldn't automatically throw something out just because it's "Country" without listening to it first.

Ernest Tubb on Decca is always worth picking up. Bill Monroe & His Blue Grass Boys on red Columbia. Flatt & Scruggs on red Columbia. Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys on red Columbia. Hank Williams on MGM. Hank Snow on RCA Victor. All common records. All worth checking out.

Wolfe wrote:

gramophone-georg wrote:

marcapra wrote:I would add Artie Shaw's Traffic Jam (really hot swing), and his Lady Be Good.
His Concerto for Clarinet is good too on 12". I like Ellington's jazz symphony Black, Brown, and Beige on two 12" Victors. For Charlie Barnet, besides Cherokee Redskin Rhumba is a must. For Woody Herman, I like his Ebony Concerto by Stravinsky on Everest LP, or probably a Columbia 78 12".

Yes, forgot about Traffic Jam. Good one! The flip side, "Serenade To A Savage" is no slouch, either.

A common A. Shaw Bluebird, yes. That was when Buddy Rich was on the band. Savage is a driving tune.

You changed your avatar!

Every time I saw your previous one, I heard Fess Williams saying "Mistah Conductah... Ah wants ta go ta HOT TOWN!"

Yeah, I know, we've all rolled our eyes and hurried past them more times than we can count, but--those "anonymous" World's Greatest Music and World's Greatest Opera sets. A year or two back I did a project to transfer (for my own pleasure) the entire run of both series, and there are some amazingly good performances in there. One standout: the Beethoven's 5th Sym., led by Eugene Ormandy, is really hot, and I think it gives a great idea of why Philadelphia was so eager to get him early on. Other sets include Fritz Reiner's first commercial recordings and opera tidbits sung by second-string members of the Met roster who would probably be first-stringers today or by future first-stringers (like Eleanor Steber and Leonard Warren) at the outset of their careers. Indeed, only one set was a disappointment, the set of Faust excerpts; nothing wrong with the performances, but the selections, in contrast to most of the sets, were not well chosen and included far too many choral selections relative to solos.

Oh, and the personnel on these things are now known or at least subject to good educated guesses; see Michael Gray's discography published in the ARSC Journal years ago, now available online as a .pdf.

drh wrote:Yeah, I know, we've all rolled our eyes and hurried past them more times than we can count, but--those "anonymous" World's Greatest Music and...

The shellac on my Debussy set is very quiet.

James.

Roaring20s wrote:

drh wrote:Yeah, I know, we've all rolled our eyes and hurried past them more times than we can count, but--those "anonymous" World's Greatest Music and...

The shellac on my Debussy set is very quiet.

James.

That's Reiner. Pressing quality in general was fine, being anonymously produced by Victor.

I remember the Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4 was very well done. Don't know who performed it. When I bought my first Victrola Orthophonic years ago, Uncle Vanya told me that these Philharmonic Transcription records were cheap or free and sounded good on an Orthophonic.

Here are a few Bluebirds that I've always thought to be excellent and well worth having, I've found these for the most part to be seldom encountered titles:

"I Have Eyes" - Artie Shaw
"They Say" - Artie Shaw
"This Is It" - Artie Shaw
"Sunburst" - Bob Chester
"Yes Indeed" - Teddy Powell
"How About You" - Teddy Powell

Sean

I don’t know how common “Sweet Georgia Brown” by Brother Bones is. But I hope it’s common enough so I can get a copy that isn’t broken in half...