Search - Various Artists :: 1930's Big Bands

1930's Big Bands
Various Artists
1930's Big Bands
Genres: Blues, Jazz, Special Interest, Soundtracks, Broadway & Vocalists
 
  •  Track Listings (16) - Disc #1


     
   

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CD Reviews

A STEP IN TIME TO BIG BAND MUSIC OF THE 1930S
Tuneful Tammy | Prescott, AZ | 05/16/2006
(5 out of 5 stars)

"Original recordings of 1930s big bands. It's as if the music is coming through your great grandparents' old Victrola radio. You'll hear the genuine music of Count Basie & His Orchestra; Casa Loma Orchestra; Benny Goodman, Earl Hines, Cab Calloway & their Orchestras; & many others.



From the liner notes of producer, Michael Brooks:

"Sandwiched between the tombstones of 1930 and 1939 we had a worldwide depression, virulent racism, the rise of Fascism [and Nazism], millions murdered in the Sioviet Union, famine and civil wars. ...out of this chaos came the most tuneful popular music ever written-and the big bands."



The first half of the '30s, dictated by the hardships of the Depression caused havoc on the hotel bands, especially for black bands who found it almost impossible to play for anything other than black audiences.



"The repeal of Prohibition and the slow economic thaw in the mid-1930s proved to be the catalyst the big bands needed. From around 1935 until the late 1940s they provided the mainstream of popular music in the U.S. College kids and young blue-collar workers alike flocked to the massive ballrooms to hear their idols...while their elders listened to the same music via network radio. During World War II the bands got a further boost by forging a link with home for the men and women serving in the armed forces..."



The producer of this installment in the Columbia Jazz Masterpiece Series has been very successful at preserving the integrity of the original pre-stereo, analog recordings, without the hissing and popping plaugued by many other recordings of the genrue.



Also included in the liner notes are very short, but informative, bios of the major players on this CD.



Of course "1930s Big Band," is sought after by the jazz purist, but is also an excellent selection for anyone persuing the history of jazz, big bands, and the sociology of the 1930s and '40s."