Great Value for Jazz

I don't get any kind of commission for this, but I would just like to give a shout out to Avid Entertainment (UK) for the superb value of its jazz sets, especially those in the Essential Collection series which are sets of 2 CDs with a full 75 minutes or more of music on each CD for only US$8 including worldwide postage from the UK. If that ain't great value, then I don't know what is.

Of course it would not be great value if the CDs were loaded with crap, but they are not. They are terrific.

I particularly recommend the sets by Peggy Lee, Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Coleman Hawkins, Gerry Mulligan, and Francis Albert Sinatra.

The Avid Entertainment (UK) Web site is absolute rubbish, but you can find these CDs if you have a mouse that is good at scrolling! But I can forgive them the crap Web site, because the music is so great and I love the free postage.

If you wanted to start a jazz collection on a budget, for your first $100 you could get 24 CDs, each one jam- packed with jazz of the highest quality here, and still have change to buy yourself a soda.

Just note that the recordings from the pre hi-fi period (early fifties) will be in remastered sound, which is pretty well done, whereas original recordings from the fifties tend to have superior sound from the get go. So, for example, if you get the Benny Goodman set, the sound from the 1938 Carnegie Hall concert will not match that of the two excellent hi-fi LPs that are also included. The Coleman Hawkins recordings were made in Holland in 1937 and 1938 and the Basie recordings in the studio from 1937 to 1939. The Miles Davis recordings are from the early and mid fifties and sound great.

Click here for Best 40 CDs list.