Ma Rainey - Mother of the Blues (111 tracks) +Album Reviews

Outstanding & Historical with (unavoidable) flaws on the sou

bobtec | Redlands, CA | 07/17/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Gertrude "Ma" Rainey was the Mother of the Blues. She was simply the best at what she did. These recordings are not just another blues compilation, they are a complete historical document. The value more than outweighs the flaws.

Pros:

1. The album has ALL of her songs (alternate takes added). This is a first time that I've ever seen a COMPLETE set.

2. The price is right. For 5 discs, you pay around 5 or 6 dollars a disc.

3. The Restoration and Remastering is the best that is currently available.

Cons:

1. Ma Rainey worked for Paramount Records (man how I wish she would have worked for Victor or Columbia). Paramount had great blues (Charlie Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Son House, Skip James, etc.), but they had very sub-standard recording techniques, and cheap compounds in their shellac (remember, Paramount was owned by a furniture company). To top it off, they scrapped all the original pressings when they went out of business. Also, Ma Rainey was probably one of the most popular artists of her time (Ida Cox, Clara Smith, and Bessie (no relation to Clara) Smith being equally as popular). So the bottom line is, JSP had to obtain the best copies available of the recordings. Also, they had to determine how much noise reduction to use without ruining the ambiance of the music (as an amateur recording engineer, I know that this process is not easy, and a lot of the deciding is by judgment call). Considering that JSP had very little (if anything) to work with, I can honestly say that this set is currently the best sounding complete set on the current market. However, you will get (original source) noise that goes from very little (eggs starting to fry in a skillet) to a lot (beginning of Mt. St. Hellen eruption). There are plenty of notes that state this (mainly covered on disc E insert). What I did was develop Paramount ears (these are ears that discard the excessive noise of a Paramount record - I developed this while listening to the Charlie Patton set). If you can't develop this technique, I'd suggest sticking with the Bessie Smith sets (but you'll miss a lot of good music), or going with the numerous greatest hits compilations of Ma Rainey (Shout Factory, Yazoo, and Millenium are all very good, but you'll still get noise).

2. This is a personal gripe, but I wish they would put the alternates on a second disc. This gripe does not justify a star reduction. Actually, with the proper programing, you can by pass the alternates.

3. As with all JSP releases, not much on notes (although the notes that are there are thorough, and show that there was a lot of study done), but at the price you pay (approx. 4 - 6 dollars / disc), you could buy a book (there is a bibliography on the right page of the disc E insert - or you could buy the book 'Railroadin' Some' by 'Mississippi' Max Haymes (author of the notes). Addendum: When I wrote this note, I meant to say it as a comparison to (let's say) Proper's Boxed sets, and NOT a slam to the authors notes. If he took offense to the remark, I humbly, and sincerely apologize (we need more writers of the blues now more than ever). Please accept my apologies.

Conclusion:

The disc is a MUST HAVE for Blues Pioneer fans, and the best currently available, and at this price, Paramount ears should be developed."

Pretty bad sound quality

Paulybrooklyn | 04/12/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"I am by no means an audiophile, but I don't think JSP did a good job remastering these recordings.

Why do I say this? Well, I had an EXTREMELY lo-fi version of some Ma Rainey stuff that was lying around for a while. What do I mean by lo-fi? I recorded a tape from a worn-out library lp about 20 years ago on a cheap stereo set, and then converted it into MP3 with my on-it's-last-legs computer last year. I think that's pretty lo-fi...

Anyway, the thing I like most on Ma Rainey's records is Tampa Red's kazoo playing (I know, I'm a nut), so I was hoping to be able to give them a good listen with this new-fangled box set. To my disappointment I could barely hear the kazoo!! I wondered if my memory had exaggerated how great those tracks were. Then I made a direct comparison with my funky home-made version, and mine was much, much clearer. Not just the kazoo-- the vocals and all the other instruments too."

A reply from the notes author to Mother Of The Blues

Mr. M. Haymes | Lancaster, UK | 01/29/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I take great exception to the comments made by the reviewer when stating that as with all JSP issues 'there is not much on notes'. Oviously these comprehensive writings were not read by the said reviewer. You would have to read the definitive book on Ma Rainey by Sandra Lieb (referred to in the notes) to get more details about this great blues singer. It is a lowdown dirty shame that the reviewer did not think the wealth of detail on this singer and her blues-the result of some 45 years listening and researching- has been completely wasted on him. Ah! Well, that's the Blues!

'Mississippi' Max Haymes (author of 'Railroadin' Some' by Music Mentor Books in 2006)"

Great music, generally not-so good sound

M. A. Casey | Las Vegas, USA | 04/11/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Gertrude "Ma" Rainey (1886-1939) was an early blues singer known for her "rough" vocal style, primitive-sounding recordings, and flamboyant stage act. She was an early influence on Bessie Smith (despite recording her first songs several months after Bessie), she was older and had years more experience. While Smith had a more urban feel to her sound, Rainey's sound had a far more rural feel. I also feel that while Smith had the technically "better" voice (i.e. smoother and not as rough), Rainey had the much more varied material. She also wrote several of her own songs, many of them dealing with the hardships of poor blacks and the life of the "ghetto" in much the same way that hip-hop or rap does today, but never glamorizing it. Her voice expresses perfectly each subject matter. For instance, on Hustlin' Blues (which really does sound like Bessie Smith's Back Water Blues, no doubt), in which she plays the role of a streetwalker, you can feel in her voice the disgust with herself and her abusive pimp, and the sadness of her situation. And on songs with sexual overtones (which is really innuendo, never blatant), she sounds extremely sensual. My husband, upon first hearing her voice, thought that Ma "sounded like a hot woman" and was really suprised to find that she was actually overweight and had terrible teeth! This was no pop-tart, to be sure!

Of course, as I mentioned, there's some plagarism. Like much blues, jazz, and R&B music, there was a lot of it. The reason many in this genre got away with this is because if you were black in those days, you had little to no rights, no residuals, you were basically ripped off by those around you, and it was considered okay to "borrow" from others, whether intentionally or not. Also, nobody, except for maybe Bessie Smith, made much money as a singer or musician. They did it because they had a passion for music, not to make a buck.

I love most of the songs on these five CDs, but this set is not without it's flaws. I wish they had only included one version of each song, for the most part. There are many songs here that have two versions, and with the possible exception of Mountain Jack Blues, they are almost identical-sounding. Usually one version is a lot better than the other. I wish they had only included one version. I do not know why they chose to include both; I guess that since Ma's recording career only lasted five years, they had to fill five CDs somehow. Also, on the second CD (B), there are no less than seven songs (or maybe I should say five, since two are "different" versions of the same song), that all sound identical. I don't mean that they sound similar, I mean that they sound identical. In fact, if they didn't have spaces between them you'd swear that it was the same song. This particular CD is my least favorite despite having some great songs on it, like Shave 'Em Dry and Toad Frog Blues. The best songs IMO are found on the CD E, the final years. Here Ma is aided by excellent and (then) innovative musicians like Georgia Tom Dorsey on piano and Tampa Red on guitar. Unfortunately, times change. Paramount decided to end her contract (more on Paramount later), her sister and mother became terminally ill and Ma decided to tend to them, and classic female blues singers were starting to become passe. Instead of finding another record company and changing her style like Bessie Smith tried to do, Ma decided to retire. A shame for fans!

Now, speaking of Paramount Records (not to be confused with the movie and TV company of the same name), what a travesty this company was. Their talent scouts were adept, but they used terrible methods! They used cheap recording materials, scrimped on every level of production, and when they went out of business in the early 1930's, they scrapped all of their master recordings! This is why much of the material sounds "primitive', even "dated". In order to transfer her recordings from 78s to vinyl then to CD, searches have had to be made to find the least worn copies, because the masters were destroyed! That this and other Paramount artists' recordings exist at all is nothing short of a miracle. I feel that if Ma had recorded for a better label (like Columbia, for example), she could have become just as legendary as Bessie Smith was. Think of it: she only recorded for five years and the recording techniques were primitive and bad, yet she IS considered a legend in blues. I can only imagine how even more successful and legendary she'd be if she'd been with a better label! Unfortunately, the sound on these CDs cannot be turned up full blast because that results in distortion for many of the songs. Still, I would rather listen to talented artists with subpar recording techniques than any untalented artist with state-of-the-art recording techniques!"

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