The legendary jazz saxophonist performs a range of standards with an all-star group consisting of Nat Adderley on trumpet, Red Norvo on vibraphone, Horace Parlan on piano, Red Mitchell on bass and Ronnie Gardiner on drums.

AVID Jazz here presents four classic Benny Carter albums including original LP liner notes on a finely re-mastered and low priced double CD. 'Benny Carter, Jazz Giant', 'Swingin' The 20's', 'Sax Ala Carter!' and 'Aspects' Giants don't come much bigger than Benny Carter, except maybe for Ben Webster .and we've got them both together for our first album on this fine CD set! A stunning line up join our giants for these sessions recorded in 1957 & 1958. Frank Rosolino on trombone, Andre Previn on piano (an underrated jazz pianist!), Barney Kessel on guitar, Leroy Vinegar on bass and Shelly Manne on drums. Old meets new for our next selection 'Swingin' The 20's', Benny is joined by legendary pianist Earl Hines for their first recorded session together. These two seasoned jazz men here show they are unafraid to take on the modern guys here represented by Leroy Vinegar and Shelly Manne the set was completely improvised ..the quartet just played! Another quartet but, a different approach for 'Sax Ala Carter!' recorded in 1960 .. standards in a relaxed style are the order of the day. Benny is joined by Jimmy Knowles on piano, Leroy Vinegar on bass and Mel Lewis on drums. All change again for these sessions from 1958 & 1959, Benny gathers together his first big band since the 1940's for 'Aspects'. This time of course it would not be a touring band but a recording band. The members were all handpicked from Hollywood's finest musicians solely for the purpose of making the record. Among the musicians were Shorty Sherock, Pete Condoli, Tommy Pederson, Buddy Colette and Shelly Manne All four albums have been digitally re-mastered for probably the finest ever sound quality!

Floyd Levin, an award-winning jazz writer, has personally known many of the jazz greats who contributed to the music's colorful history. In this collection of his articles, published mostly in jazz magazines over a fifty-year period, Levin takes us into the nightclubs, the recording studios, the record companies, and, most compellingly, into the lives of the musicians who made the great moments of the traditional jazz and swing eras. Brilliantly weaving anecdotal material, primary research, and music analysis into every chapter, "Classic Jazz: A Personal View of the Music and the Musicians" is a gold mine of information on a rich segment of American popular music. This collection of articles begins with Levin's first published piece and includes several new articles that were inspired by his work on this compilation. The articles are organized thematically, beginning with a piece on Kid Ory's early recordings and ending with a newly written article about the campaign to put up a monument to Louis Armstrong in New Orleans. Along the way, Levin gives in-depth profiles of many well-known jazz legends, such as Jelly Roll Morton, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong, and many lesser-known figures who contributed greatly to the development of jazz. Extensively illustrated with previously unpublished photographs from Levin's personal collection, this wonderfully readable and extremely personal book is full of information that is not available elsewhere. "Classic Jazz: A Personal View of the Music and the Musicians" will be celebrated by jazz scholars and fans everywhere for the overview it provides of the music's evolution, and for the love of jazz it inspires on every page.

Volume ten in the complete chronological recordings of Benny Carter, as compiled and presented on compact disc in 2006 by the Classics label, contains most of the originally issued master takes from his Verve and Victor sessions which transpired in New York and Los Angeles during the period between July 26, 1952 and January 4, 1954. What didn't make it onto this disc was a chunk of the Carter discography dating from August and October 1952, including the material released as the Alone Together album by "Benny Carter with the Oscar Peterson Trio and Buddy Rich" and a couple of tunes by Benny Carter's Orchestra with vocals by Savannah Churchill. Tracks one-three are performed by a solid little octet, while tracks four and six exhibit all the traits of polished early-'50s studio production, laying it on thickly using a large studio orchestra glazed with strings, a harp, and neatly harmonized group vocals. Even so, Carter sounds marvelous out in front with his creamy alto sax. Tracks five, seven, and eight are even better examples of Benny Carter's early-'50s sound. Tracks nine-twelve, played by Carter and a quartet led by pianist Oscar Peterson, were issued on a 10" long-playing Verve record with the word "Cosmopolite" on the cover. The remaining selections on this disc feature the Benny Carter Quartet augmented by a string and wind ensemble arranged and conducted by Joe Glover. At no point during this portion of his career did Carter sound like he was selling out or succumbing to convention. True, the addition of strings, beefed up orchestral charts, and especially the oozy vocals on "I Wanna Go Home" signal a momentary concession to perceived notions of popular taste, but in the larger scheme of things, and especially when placed into context as a relatively brief chapter in the remarkably long life and career of Benny Carter, this is pleasant enough stuff and it's precisely what Carter thought he needed to do during the early 1950s. ~ arwulf arwulf