Artist: Peggy Lee
     Album: Peggy Lee with the Dave Barbour Band
     Year: 1945
     Label: Laserlight
     Format/bitrate: mp3, 320 kb/s
     Size: 83 mb


In the late '40s, Peggy Lee launched a successful solo singing career on records and radio without doing much in the way of live performing. As a part of that, she made a lot of transcriptions for radio play, backed by a small jazz band led by her guitarist-husband Dave Barbour. This budget compilation contains 14 of the "MacGregor" transcriptions, on which Lee addresses standards like "I Should Care," "September In The Rain," and "Nice Work If You Can Get It," with generous soloing space given to the band. William Ruhlmann, AMG

В первый день нового года не мешало бы расслабиться и отдохнуть хорошенько перед предстоящим годом (то ли еще будет!), а для этого предлагаю послушать бархатный альбом в завораживающем исполнении великолепной Peggy Lee в сопровождении небольшого оркестра под управлением её мужа Dave Barbour!

    Artist: Jimmy Smith
    Album: Testifyin'
    Label: Groove Hut
    Year: 1974 - 1975; release: 2008
    Genre: Jazz/Hard Bop
    Format mp3, bitrate: 256 kb/s vbr
    Time: 1:17:05
    Size: 107 Mb

Playing piano-style single-note lines on his Hammond B-3 organ, Jimmy Smith revolutionized the use of the instrument in a jazz combo setting in the mid-'50s and early '60s with his recordings for Blue Note Records. After he moved to Verve Records, though, he began working in more big-band settings, experimenting a bit, although he was always the same Jimmy Smith whose rapid runs on the B-3 careened, stuttered, glided, and flashed all over the place at a frequently breathless pace. No matter what venue he was playing, where he recorded, or what label he was on, Smith was steady in what he did, and although he stayed close to the blues, there may not be a more continuously joyful sounding legacy in the history of modern jazz. This release brings together two albums previously unavailable on CD, 1974's Paid in Full, which Smith sold only through mail order and at his concerts, and 1975's Jimmy Smith, a live album with, in the original LP format, a show from Tel Aviv on side one and a show from L.A. on side two. It's all Jimmy Smith being Jimmy Smith, and if these two rare LPs aren't exactly essential to the Smith canon, they certainly don't diminish it. - Steve Leggett at All Music Guide

     Artist: Roby Lakatos & His Ensemble
     Album: As Time goes By
     Label: Deutsche Grammophon / Universal Music
     Year: 2002
     Format, bitrate: mp3, 320 kb/s
     Time: 1:07:56
     Size: 142 MB


    

     It is the gypsy musical tradition that Lakatos can lay full claim to through descent from the famed violinist Jбnos Bihari, whose name is associated with the patriotic Hungarian Rбkoczy March. Not only in central Europe, but from Spain to Russia as well, gypsies and their music have long been the stuff of legend.

     Artist: Don Cherry
     Album: Multikulti
     Quality: FLAC
     Size: 150+132 MB
     Year: 1990
     Label: A&M Records
     Total time: 50:54





     It's obvious right from the title that Multikulti is another of Don Cherry's trademark fusions of jazz and world music, this time around with a heavy African influence. There's definitely enough good music here to make Multikulti worthwhile for fans of Cherry's world fusion explorations.

     Artist: Charlie Haden (with Don Cherry and Ed Blackwell)
     Album: The Montreal Tapes
     Label: Verve (523 260-2)
     Year: 1989; release: 1994
     Genre: Modern Jazz
     Format, bitrate: FLAC & mp3 @ 320 kbps
     Time: 58:20
     Size: FLAC: ~180 + ~175 MB; mp3: ~133 MB

     This has to be one of my favorite performances from one of the tightest ensembles ever to play in this idiom. Although it is Haden's album, this is really a group effort. Each individual shines in their respective role. I am constantly amazed by the subtlety and melodic quality of Ed Blackwell's drumming. As a music professor, specifically a jazz instructor, I have made all of my drum students study this album. Nor can enough be said about Haden's playing at this concert. He builds his lines with an authority that is assured and vibrant. The musical logic in his ideas are breathtaking. You can hear where he is taking his line and when he gets there, it's nirvana. One highlight of this album is Don Cherry's Art Deco, there's a certain wistfulness in the playing that compelled me to keep turning to this performance over and over again after I learned of his passing. Okay, so I like this recording. I strongly recommend it.~Customer Review at amazon.com

    Artist: Count Basie & Friends
    Album: 100Th Birthday Bash 2cd
    Label: Roulette Records/Blue Note
    Year: 1957 - 1962; release: 2004
    Format mp3, bitrate: 320 kb/s
    Time: 1:38:12
    Size: 238 Mb (full covers)
    AMG Rating:


Count Basie & Friends: 100th Birthday Bash is, quite simply, a stunningly remastered double-disc collection of Basie collaborations and presentations of smaller subgroups under his umbrella during his tenure with Roulette and recorded in the late '50s, though a couple of sides ("I Want a Little Girl" and "The Late Late Show") were issued originally on Capitol — with Nat King Cole fronting the Basie band and Gerald Wiggins instead of the Count on piano. This set improves upon the CD issue by Ember with eight additional cuts and far better sound. The tunes — with arrangements by saxophonist Frank Foster, Neal Hefti, Jimmy Mundy, Quincy Jones, Benny Carter, and others — are a mix of vocal cuts with guests such as Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, Tony Bennett, Irene Reid, Sarah Vaughan, and (of course) the band's own singer, Joe Williams. Whether it's a duet like "Teach Me Tonight" between Vaughan and Williams, Billy Eckstine singing "Lonesome Lover Blues" and Ben Webster soloing on the same tune, Lambert, Hendricks & Ross vocalizing on "Jumping at the Woodside," or the burning version of "April in Paris" recorded live in Sweden with an arrangement by Wild Bill Davis, this set cooks from top to bottom and is an excellent — even stellar — view of the Basie orchestra during a very creative and fertile period. ~ Thom Jurek , All Music Guide

     Artist: ‘Bunk’ Johnson
     Album: The King of The Blues
     Label: American Music
     Year: 1944
     Format, bitrate: MP3, 320 kb/s ; FLAC
     Size: 135 MB; 243 mb





   

     "...The music was executed in the style known as new Orleans...with the greatest freedom but also with an astonishing sobriet. Nobody tried to show how fast he could play or how high...nor tried to conceal the tune. Bunk is an artist of delicate imagination, meditative in style rather than flashy, and master of the darkest trumpet tone I have ever heard. He is also the greatest master of "blue" or off-pitched notes/ The degrees of his deviation from normal pitch are infinite, and the taste with which he exploits this variety merits no less a word than impeccable. His timbers, his intonations, and his melody invention are at all times expressive, at all times reasonable and at all times completely interesting. his work takes on, in consequence depth, ease and lucidity. Nothing could be less sentimental or speak more seriously from the heart, or be less jittery. Certainly no music was ever less confused...." - critic and composer Virgil Thomson, linesr notes

     Artist: Mary Lou Williams
     Album: Solo Recital Montreux Jazz Festival 1978
     Label - OJC/Pablo
     Year: 1978, release: 1998
     Quality: MP3@320 kbps
     Size: 100 mb (sharebee)
     Total time - 45:45
     AMG Rating:


Mary Lou Williams was sporadically recorded during most of her career, so her appearance on a 1979 release (two years before her death) as a solo pianist at the 1978 Montreux Jazz Festival was a welcome addition to her discography and ended up being one of her greatest recordings. The opening medley is a history of jazz and includes spiritual, ragtime, gospel, Kansas City swing, boogie-woogie, and bop, all of which Williams plays with authority. Her stunning takes of "Over the Rainbow" and "Tea for Two" are reminiscent of Art Tatum with their rich harmonic sense and fancy flourishes. Williams also delights the audience with fresh looks at her compositions "Little Joe from Chicago" and "What's Your Story, Morning Glory?" Her dramatic blues "Concerto Alone at Montreux" has a dirge-like air. Most of the tracks also appear in the 2004 DVD release of this concert, though "Concerto Alone at Montreux" was omitted. This brilliant live CD should be a part of any jazz piano fan's collection. ~ Ken Dryden, All Music Guide

    Artist: Jimmy Smith
    Album: The Best Of Jimmy Smith [Verve '68]
    Label: Verve
    Year: 1968; release:
    Genre: Jazz/Hard Bop
    Format mp3, bitrate: 320 kb/s
    Time: 39:03
    Size: 93,03

This compilation contains materials from his previous Verve albums "Got My Mojo Workin'", "Bashin'", "Organ Grinder Swing", "Hoochie Coochie Man", "The Cat" and "Hobo Flats". - See details inside.

     Artist: Terry Gibbs Dream Band (Vol.6)
     Album: One More Time
     Label: Contemporary
     Year: 1959
     Format, Bit Rate: Mp3 320 Kbps
     Time: 77:12
     Size: 159 Mb



In August 2001, Terry Gibbs was digging around in one of the closets of his Los Angeles home when came across about 25 boxes of old reel-to-reel tapes. As it turned out, some of those tapes contained previously unreleased Dream Band recordings of 1959 gigs in Hollywood. So Gibbs contacted Fantasy about the possibility of putting out some of that live material -- which had remained in the vibist/bandleader's private collection for over 40 years -- and the result is Dream Band, Vol. 6: One More Time (a generally excellent CD that Fantasy decided to release on Contemporary). In 1959, Gibbs' Dream Band was exactly that; it boasted the cream of the West Coast crop, and the L.A.-based heavyweights who Gibbs employs on these hard-swinging performances include trumpeter Conte Candoli, pianist Pete Jolly, tenor saxman Bill Perkins, and drummer Mel Lewis. Most of the material is instrumental, although singer Irene Kral has pleasing spots on the standards "Moonlight in Vermont," "Sometimes I'm Happy," and "Lover, Come Back to Me." Thankfully, the sound quality is, by late-'50s/early stereo standards, quite good. So why did recordings of this quality remain in the can for so long? Quite often, musicians will record their live shows, place the tapes in their vaults, and forget about them -- which is obviously what happened with these 1959 recordings. Gibbs had forgotten about them but was pleasantly surprised when he came across the old reel-to-reel tapes in the summer of 2001. Although generally excellent, One More Time falls short of essential; nonetheless, Gibbs' hardcore fans will be thrilled to see these recordings become commercially available after remaining in the can for so long. ~ Alex Henderson, All Music Guide

     Artist: Kenny Wayne Shepherd
     Album: 10 Days Out (Blues from the Backroads)
     Label: Reprise records
     Year:rel.Jan 23, 2007
     Format: MP3@320 Kb/s
     Time: (CD 77:49)
     Size: 168.10 Mb,
     AMG rating:

     Artist:Kenny Drew
     Album:Season's Greetings
     Label:Pony Canyon
     Release:December 15, 2006
     Format/Bitrate: MP3/320
     Size: 63.5MB

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!