What to look for - upcoming purchase

[muffinass]

Hi everyone,

I'm heading out on Friday to look through a local collector's pile of jazz 78s and am quite unsure of what to look for.

The collection is comprised mostly of discs from the '40s, so I'm wondering what labels and artists from that period are worth grabbing.

It's a vague question, I know, but he's selling them for 50 cents each and as much as I'd love to walk away with the whole collection, I have very limited space as well as time to listen to everything.

Any suggestions (as vague as my question even) are appreciated!

[Torjazzer]

There was a LOT of some great jazz produced during that period. Sadly, a lot has been forgotten. Mostly people only think of Glenn Miller regarding that period. I look for independent labels. Here are some examples of labels to look for:
Keynote, Savoy, Continental. There is also the Blue Note label, however I doubt if any collector would be selling those for 50 cents.
I should warn you: these records can have a lot of surface noise. The war caused materials to be rationed (or banned) and the smaller labels did not have their own pressing plants, needing larger companied to press them on consignment. The result was a soft, brittle record that should never see the sharp end of a steel needle. Strictly for modern electric pickup. Keynotes are particularly known for surface noise. Any time I see a copy of Little Jazz (Roy Eldridge) performing St. Louis Blues I buy it, hoping to get a nice-playing copy. Hasn't happened yet. However, getting past the noise you'll find wonderful music on these labels. Enjoy.

[Wolfe]

Awfully general question to apply to a very large subject. Especially if you aren't familiar with jazz of that era.

But, yeah, the smaller labels like the ones mentioned above and ones like Musiccraft and Commodore Music Shop and Clef may attract special interest, Blue Notes are wonderful to find, if you can find them.

The quality tends to be variable and sometimes you'll find these 78's (like on Commodore) being dubs of other 78's.

People tend to dismiss all those red (microphone label) Columbia's, but I always look at them to find the re-pressings of early and hard to fond 1920's jazz sides that they put out in the 1940's.

[FloridaClay]

Humm. Really impossible to answer as what one likes and doesn't musically is so individual and subjective.

Being someone who bought way too much in bulk buys early on and lived to regret it, I guess my main advice would be to be critical about condition. Can't tell you how often I have gotten home with a big bunch and then found in the process of cleaning and testing that there were things I should have caught before I bought them and didn't -- subtle cracks and/or grayed, worn surfaces (I optomistically hoped was just dirt) creating so much surface noise to make a record practically unusable. Unless it's something you just gotta have regardless of condition, look for clean, shiny surfaces and no chips--at least no chips extending into the playing area. Good clean labels are nice too.

Clay

[Henry]

What Clay said. In addition, I believe that some of the late pressings were on vinyl, so beware.

[syncopeter]

Don't forget Commodore jazz. Each and every disc on that label is worth having. Coomodore records were made by a jazz enthousiast for jazz enthousiasts. They used a special cutting system so that normal 10" records would play over 4 minutes. The very rare 12" discs would play over six minutes, giving room for solos of 16 to 24 bars. No race discrimination here too.

[Wolfe]

12" Commodores are rare?

I must have come across almost as many of the 12 as of 10.

[OrthoSean]

I don't think really any Commodore issues are exactly rare or even that scarce in either 10 or 12 inch. Perhaps Peter means outside of the US? The most desireable issues from my experience are the Billie Holiday issues, all of which I've owned multiple times over.

Sean