Name: The Best of Ken Burns Jazz
Brand: Alliance Entertainment
SKU: 303716
Availability: OutOfStock

Performer Notes

Compilation producers include: Ken Burns, Steve Berkowitz, Sarah Botstein, Michael Cuscuna, Peter Miller.
Includes liner notes by Ken Burns.
Digitally remastered by Seth Foster and Mark Wilder (Sony Studios, New York, New York).
This is part of the Columbia/Legacy Ken Burns JAZZ series.
Personnel: Louis Armstrong (vocals, trumpet); Noble Sissle, Baby Cox, Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan (vocals); "Big" Mike McKendrick (guitar, banjo); Eddie Durham, Eddie Lang, Freddie Green, Will Johnson, George Van Eps, Al Avola, Lawrence Lucie, Paul Chapman, Jimmy Miller , Lonnie Johnson, Remo Palmieri (guitar); Johnny St. Cyr, Fred Guy (banjo); Oscar Madera (violin); Sidney Bechet (clarinet, soprano saxophone); Chauncey Houghton, Jimmy Dorsey, Albert Nicholas, Charlie Holmes (clarinet, alto saxophone); Herschel Evans (clarinet, tenor saxophone); Harry Carney (clarinet, baritone saxophone); Darnell Howard, Omer Simeon, Artie Shaw, Barney Bigard, Benny Goodman, Buster Bailey (clarinet); Jack Washington (alto saxophone, baritone saxophone); Doc Ryker, Lester Boone, Earle Warren, Junior Adderley, George James, Hilton Jefferson, Ernie Powell, Jimmy Powell , Norris Turney, Otto Hardwick, Russell Procope, Sahib Shihab, Nuncio "Toots" Mondello, Benny Carter , Paul Desmond, Les Robinson, Hank Freeman, Hymie Schertzer, Charlie Parker (alto saxophone); Arthur Rollini, Ronnie Perry , Albert Washington, Jr., Todd Williams , Hank Mobley, Gil White, John Coltrane, Dick Clark , Lester Young , Teddy Hill, Tony Pastor, Ben Webster, Bill Easley (tenor saxophone); Frankie Trumbauer (C-melody saxophone); Joe Temperley (baritone saxophone); Nate Kazebier, Ralph Muzillo, Cootie Williams, Dizzy Gillespie, Ed Lewis, Chuck Peterson, Demas Dean, John Best , Harry "Sweets" Edison , Otis Johnson, Henry "Red" Allen, Russell Smith, Claude Bowen, Joe Wilder, Kenny Dorham, Lew Soloff, Marcus Belgrave, Miles Davis, Roy Eldridge, Arthur Whetsol, Wynton Marsalis, Zilner Randolph, Wendell Culley, Wallace Jones, Bubber Miley, Buck Clayton, Bunny Berigan (trumpet); George Mitchell, Rex Stewart, Bix Beiderbecke (cornet); Bill Rank, Jack Lacey, Dicky Wells, George Arus, Chester Burrill, J.C. Higginbotham, Joe "Tricky Sam" Nanton, Keg Johnson, Kid Ory, Lawrence Brown , Art Baron, Wycliffe Gordon, Benny Morton, Dan Minor, Harry Rodgers, Claude Jones, Red Ballard, Preston Jackson, Britt Woodman (trombone); Juan Tizol (valve trombone); Clyde Hart, Count Basie, Paul Mertz, Charlie Alexander , Dave Brubeck, Duke Ellington, Eddie Heywood, Fletcher Henderson, Frank Froeba, Horace Silver, Erskine Butterfield, Jelly Roll Morton, Luis Russell, Roland Hanna, Thelonious Monk, Tommy Flanagan, Bill Evans , Les Burness, John Malachi (piano); Milt Jackson (vibraphone); Wilbert Kirk, Cozy Cole, Herbert Cowans, Gene Krupa, Herlin Riley, Jimmy Cobb , Jo Jones , Joe Morello, Andrew Hilaire, Paul Barbarin, Roy Haynes, Art Taylor, Sonny Greer, Tubby Hall, Walter Johnson , Cliff Leeman, Chauncey Morehouse (drums); Marty Bloom (sound effects).
Recording information: 09/21/1926-10/10/1992.
Director: David Berger .
Arrangers: Fletcher Henderson; Fud Livingston; Jerry Gray; Horace Henderson; Jelly Roll Morton.
Documentarian Ken Burns's ten-part JAZZ is an exhaustive history of that branch of American music, beginning with jazz's inception and moving with care and detail through ensuing decades. Though jazz developments from the '60s onward are given short shrift, the documentary, the five-disc box, and this one-disc distillation, all hit the prime target of the '20s through the '50s nicely. Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk represent the bebop contingent, while Miles Davis fills the cool jazz quota. Noble Sissle, Jelly Roll Morton, and of course Louis Armstrong represent jazz's beginnings, and John Coltrane's "Giant Steps" points towards the direction the music would take in the '60s.