DCC Archive Would DCC ever consider issuing music from the 78 rpm-era?

Just wondering, because right now, I think the world could benefit from a top notch, comprehensive collection of vintage Fletcher Henderson, Benny Goodman's small group recordings (RCA Victor's set is really harsh with the noise reduction), Dizzy Gillespie's big band stuff from the 40's, and Count Basie's early material that's now owned by Columbia. Much of this stuff is available, but I don't think any of the current sets are very satisfactory. The domestic issues have harsh noise reduction. With the exception of certain chunks of the Fletcher Henderson music and the Jones-Smith Inc. tracks from Count Basie, all the above stuff I listed hasn't been covered yet by such stellar UK labels like Hep, JSP, etc. (often done by such engineers as Ted Kendall and John R.T. Davies who have an immense reputation mastering this material). Definitive has issued a lot of this stuff, but I think they're really overrated. Despite the "24-bit remastering and meticulous restoration," the source discs are a mixed bag, with some having too much wear and some others that are simply poor pressings. Plus, the pitch hasn't been corrected for most of the discs. There's also the Classics CD's (they're the guys who use years for their titles), but they're always known for mixed results.

Would it be easier and cheaper for DCC to do this material? Licensing wouldn't be much of an issue if it's old enough, and Steve's got a great collection of 78's (wouldn't be surprised if he was able to just use his own records for source material).

[ October 04, 2001: Message edited by: Camarillo ]

 

A lot of Jazz packages from the UK and Japan are very good, both legit on small labels and bootleg. Bix Beiderbecke (sp) is an example. My uncle has tons of Bix, some Vocalions, I know he has some EXTREMELY rare RCA white labels. He let me borrow a ton of his stuff. Some of the best 78RPM compilations were imports, UK...etc...

 

Man, that sucks. I think RCA and Columbia have always been hit or miss with their catalog. Everything RCA/BMG did until the mid-90's was terrible. Bad sources, excessive noise reduction...take one listen to the Jelly Roll Morton Centennial Box and the Blanton-Webster Band and you'll know what I mean. Things have improved a bit (still use CEDAR, which I know Steve has got to hate), and the big 1927-1973 Centennial Duke Ellington box was really welcome.

I'm still waiting on Columbia to fix their Basie material. They've finally come around on their Billie Holiday catalog, thank god.

I may try hunting in Japan like Sckott suggested. I've concentrated most of my efforts in the UK so far and it's brought me plenty of great reissues (Amazon.co.uk is a great place to look, or you can buy the CD's of John Davies's work from the man himself at www.jazzrescue.com; he usually stocks copies of his own work and sells them at the marked price, which is pretty cheap). It's still nice to have this stuff on CD, though, if just for the convenience of shuffling through twenty or thirty classics in one sitting.

[ October 04, 2001: Message edited by: Camarillo ]

 

Re Camarillo's post:
The sound on Columbia's Billie Holiday box is probably better than their first efforts--t especially the 1st volumes of "The Quintessential Billie Holiday are terrible. All the high frequencies are filtered out. However I'm worried about the new Holiday box because of co-producer Michael Brooks' comments in ICE mag recently. He said that they managed to "fix" the "distortion" that Billie's vocals sometimes created on the recordings. How do you "fix" distortion on mono recordings made on metal masters in the 1930s and 1940s without drastically altering the sound?

 

Sounds like it's a no-go based on Steve's reply, still FWIW Camarillo's idea appeals to me IMMENSELY. Anything DCC can do to release this old stuff would be great--preferably on SACD!

[ October 04, 2001: Message edited by: GregM ]

 

I'm certain the Billie Holiday box set does sound better. I haven't picked it up yet (it just came out yesterday), but in the last ten years, there have been only two attempts at upgrading the sound on the Columbia sides: "Love Songs" and "Greatest Hits." Both add up to about two dozen songs, some of which I wouldn't even consider her best records. Still, when you compare them to the older Essential discs, it's a huge improvement.

Better digital technology, a better approach to the material, and better sources helped with the Armstrong set and I'm sure it helped with the Holiday set, too. Of course, others have proven you don't need to wait for improvements in digital sampling, etc. to make this music sound good on CD, but regardless...

 

Steve is right on the money when it comes to bootleg issues of 78rpm compilations on CD.

 

To all interested board members: Steve Hoffman-mastered CD's of vintage 78's by both
Billie Holliday and Bing Crosby were released by MCA back in the '80's, if you're curious to hear his work on that material. As usual, his work on those tracks was topnotch!

 

What's the name of the Bing Crosby CD that Steve mastered?

 

Steve compiled 2 CD's of Bing's material before joining DCC. Unfortunately the titles escape my memory, but one consisted of Bing's biggest chart hits on Decca, while the other had an all-Christmas theme to it, including, of course, "White Christmas"!

[ October 07, 2001: Message edited by: luke j chung ]