Search - Roy Eldridge :: Little Jazz Trumpet Giant

A Link Between Satchmo and Dizzy

Original Mixed Up-Kid | New York United States | 06/08/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Sorry to label the man but he is a great one ...you can hear the emotion..He can really blow...this CD set clocks in at about at 5 hours and it captures a great musician on excellent sound from the early days of his Little Jazz to Swing with Krupa and other names to his own band and beyond...the material spans,live material, excellent sounding source materials and mixes unheard by me...these excellent UK companies give consumers a real treat..and with great books.. I am certain experts may look down on these type of collections but besides the value they are wonderful fun and gives great overviews on quality remastered sound that can only spur interest in Jazz."

Great selection

Nikica Gilic | Zagreb, Croatia | 09/30/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Comprehensive overview of the most significant part of a rich career - to say the least. This 4 CD collection starts with Roy's very first recording in 1935 (with Teddy Hill's big band), and ends with some of his choisiest work from the 50's. The booklet is very informative; it has some fine pictures and complete dates and personell listing. Also; it tells the story of Eldridge's career prior to his first recordings.



Sound quality is fine and music is, well, perfect.



Naturally, I already have some of the tracks in Teddy Wilson, Billie Holiday, Gene Krupa or Fletcher henderson collections, but this is still great.

There are some of the best swing combos I have ever heard in this collection, Roy's work in France is marvelous, there are the incredible "Metronome All stars" (on "St. Louis Blues" in two tempos...) with great Billy Eckstine, Lester Young, Terry Gibbs, Kai Winding and others... Big band tracks lag behind a bit (even Henderson, influntial as he was, doesn't fare well when compared to Krupa's, Eldridge's or Hawkins' combos represented here). But, the big band sides are still good or very good swing music.



Contributions of Coleman Hawkins, Chu Berry, Benny Goodman, Oscar Peterson, Gene Krupa, Israel Crosby (on Teddy Wilson's rightly famous "Blues in C sharp minor"), Don Byas, Buddy Tate and others are great but I would particularly like to recomend the Paris tracks, particularly those with Claude Bolling (duos: "Wild man blues" and "Fireworks"). These are marvelous reworking od Armstrong-Hines classics...

All swing fans should get this music on this or any other collections

"

Blow, Roy, blow! What an awesome collection on 4 CDs.

David G. Lucas | Tsukuba Japan, Chicago IL, Milwaukee WI, Monroe WI | 05/20/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"You know how hot young guitarists always say that they discovered Muddy Waters and Buddy Guy through the Rolling Stones or Eric Clapton? The amazing Anita O'Day introduced me to Roy Eldridge in much the same way.



I am a big Anita O'Day fan, and finally one day I followed her music back to the Gene Krupa days, and then one tune changed forever how I feel about the trumpet. "Let Me Off Uptown" starts off with a jazzy conversation between Anita and Roy that immediately made me want to know who Roy was. He sings back to her and gets the invitation to "Blow, Roy, blow!" and then he just blew me away. Roy Eldridge, the hottest trumpet player on the circuit since Louis and reigning champion on my playlist all the way up to Clifford Brown.



Well, turns out that tune was also an album title; the whole Gene Krupa band is hot and Eldridge provided the steam on thier recordings. From there, you just have to get his whole collection! Far too many albums to choose from, but this amazing twenty year overview of Eldridge's career highlights is a truly joy giving start on the road to absolutely loving the role of the trumpet in big band swing.



Let your ears lead the way to the great ones..."