This week’s theme: Selected items in honor of the birthday of the Lovely Mrs. JC. Featured artists include Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Dexter Gordon, Annie Ross, Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae, Ella Fitzgerald, Sammy Davis Jr., Rosemary Clooney, Billie Holiday, Nancy Lamott, Frank Sinatra, Melissa Errico, Gerry Mulligan, Judy Holliday, Bill Evans, Nat Cole, Dexter Gordon, Maxine Sullivan.

This week’s podcast explores the relatively new boxed set from Craft Records called Haunted Heart: The Legendary Riverside Studio Recordings by the Bill Evans Trio featuring Scott Lazaro and Paul Motian. It features the Riverside LPs Portrait in Jazz and Explorations, with 26 alternates and outtakes, including 17 recordings that had never been released before. The show offers a mix of some of the original issues, such as Autumn Leaves and Nardis, with many of the newly released takes.

This week’s theme: Happy Third Anniversary to the Jazz Collector Live radio show and podcast, featuring the best of something. Featured artists include John Coltrane, Lee Morgan, Curtis Fuller, Kenny Drew, Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, Miles Davis, Hank Mobley, Wynton Kelly, Jimmy Cobb, Bill Evans, Cannonball Adderley, Percy Heath, Connie Kay, Stan Getz, Duke Jordan, Jimmy Raney, Zoot Sims, Oscar Peterson, Joe Pass, Rosemary Clooney, Warren Vache, Scott Hamilton, Cal Collins, Charlie Parker, Joao Gilberto, Maxine Sullivan, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Roland Kirk, Charles Mingus, John Handy, Clifford Brown, Max Roach, Harold Land, Richie Powell, Charlie Parker, LaVern Baker, Art Blakey, Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Cedar Walton and more.

This week’s theme: Jazz and vocal versions of songs written by Irving Berlin. Featured artists include John Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Sonny Rollins, Ray Bryant, Max Roach, George Bryant, Charles McPherson, Jackie McLean, Rosemary Clooney, Ed Bickert, Scott Hamilton, John Oddo, Scott Hamilton, Warren Vache, Bill Evans, Ella Fitzgerald, Nancy Lamott, Duke Jordan, Walter Bishop Jr., Oscar Peterson, Dinah Washington, Lockjaw Davis, Paul Quinichette, Clark Terry, Lou Donaldson, Horace Silver, Arthur Taylor.

This week’s theme: The Gershwin Songbook, as played by jazz pianists and their groups. Featured artists include: Oscar Peterson, Art Tatum, Bill Evans, Herbie Hancock, Red Garland, Billy Taylor, Bud Powell, Oscar Pettiford, Art Blakey, Paul Motian, Scott LaFaro, Hampton Hawes, Red Mitchell, Chuck Thompson, John Lewis, Percy Heath, Connie Kay, Ray Brown, Ed Thigpen, John Ore, J.C. Moses, Ray Barreto, Arthur Taylor, Paul Chambers, Randy Weston

This week’s theme: All the Things You Are in multiple settings. Featured artists include Art Tatum, Ben Webster, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Bill Evans, Eddie Gomez, Tal Farlow, Dan Axelrod, Eddie Costa, Booker Ervin, Tommy Flanagan, Richard Davis, Alan Dawson, Phineas Newborn Jr., Oscar Pettiford, Kenny Clarke, Johnny Griffin, John Coltrane, Hank Mobley, Lee Morgan, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, Art Blakey, Ella Fitzgerald, Horace Silver, Rosemary Clooney, Scott Hamilton, Warren Vache, Carmen McRae, Kenny Dorham, Doug Watkins, Dexter Gordon, Barry Harris, Buster Williams, Tootie Heath.

In my online adventures I stopped at a few places, Blue Note, Craft, and a label called The Lost Recordings. I bought two vinyl reissue records from Craft: The Kenny Drew Trio originally on Riverside and Miles Davis, The Musings of Miles originally on Prestige. I think I paid $39 for Miles and $18 for Kenny Drew. I bought these two records for a couple of reasons. One was to check out the new version of the Original Jazz Classics series. I admit that I hated the original OJCs, which began in 1983. While I appreciated that the music was being made available, I never liked the packaging, i.e., the thin vinyl and thin covers. I would buy the OJCs because they were not overly expensive and they could fill gaps in my collection, but I always sought to replace them with original pressings. Of course. Wouldn’t you? I had reached the point where I didn’t own any more of the original OJCs. When Craft came out with the current OJC series, I reached out to their public relations people to get review copies, but, alas, I was not placed on the list, despite my seemingly stellar credentials as not just the owner of Jazz Collector dot com, but also as the host of the Jazz Collector Radio podcast. In any case, I wasn’t getting any free copies of anything from Craft, so when the urge to buy became too strong, I bit the bullet and ordered these two records, plus the Bill Evans boxed set called Haunted Heart, which I haven’t even opened yet.

I chose the Miles and Kenny Drew records primarily because of my radio show/podcast. I have an original pressing of The Musings of Miles, but I hate bringing some of these $1,000 records into the radio studio if I can avoid it. So I could kill two bird with one stone: I could check out the new Craft OJC Series and have an alternative to bring into the studio when it came time to play the Musings of Miles, which I did on the podcast called Old Vinyl, New Bottles. I bought the Kenny Drew Trio record because I don’t own an original copy and I had decided to do a radio show/podcast on Kenny Drew.  When I did do that podcast, Unsung Artists – Kenny Drew on Piano, I was able to use the Craft reissue and play a couple of tracks.

My opinion of the new Craft OJC series is different that that for the original OJCs. I really like these reissues. I liked that they used heavier vinyl, heavier cardboard, and they keep the original packaging. I’m no audiophile, but they sound great to me. There’s a slight mistake on the Kenny Drew packaging band – they refer to it is Kenny Drew’s first as a leader, when, to my knowledge, he had recorded two or three records as a leader prior to this one (a 10-incher on Blue Note, one on Norgran, and one on East-West?). But the band comes off, so it’s merely a packaging thing. For the Miles record, I had always felt that on the original record, Miles’ trumpet on the track “I See Your Face Before Me,” was recorded at too low a volume. I was hoping the reissue would fix that, but it doesn’t. Still, it’s a great record and package. Bottom line, for anyone who doesn’t own an original pressing and wants the music, I don’t think you can go wrong with these OJC vinyl pressings at their prices.

As always, I’m curious as to what others have experienced with these reissues, but I also realize that most of my most loyal readers are not here anymore since I stopped posting regularly and started doing more of the radio shows/podcasts.

BTW, in addition to the Craft reissues, I bought a few new/old Blue Notes. Hopefully, I will be inspired to listen to them and write about them sometime soon.

The post Old Vinyl, New Bottles, Craft OJCs first appeared on jazzcollector.com.]]> https://jazzcollector.com/riverside/old-vinyl-new-bottles-craft-ojcs/feed/ 4 9841 https://jazzcollector.com/podcast/podcast-more-of-the-best-of-26/ https://jazzcollector.com/podcast/podcast-more-of-the-best-of-26/#comments Thu, 08 Jan 2026 16:46:38 +0000 https://jazzcollector.com/?p=9811 Continuing last week’s theme, celebrating the New Year with jazz vinyl featuring the number 26 in the catalog number. Featured artists include Sonny Rollins, Max [...]

This week’s theme: Part two of our exploration of jazz tracks that have the name of a woman in the title. Featured artists include Miles Davis, Gil Evans, Bill Evans, Eddie Costa, Ray Charles, Paul Desmond, Jim Hall, Art Blakey, Eddie Jefferson, Lee Morgan, Bobby Timmons, Benny Golson, Billy Taylor, Stan Getz, Al Haig, Jimmy Raney, Cannonball Adderley, Nat Adderley, Sam Jones, Louis Hayes, Barry Harris, Jimmy Rushing, Coleman Hawkins, Jackie McLean, Freddie Redd, Tina Brooks, Nat King Cole, Sweets Edison, and more.

Along the same vein, I took note of two things. First, I discovered a label called The Lost Recordings while doing a search on John Coltrane. On their web page it states: “We travel the world in search of rare or previously unreleased recordings by legendary artists. Using our unique restoration process, we bring this priceless heritage back to life.” I will say, for the record, although they refer to the heritage as priceless, every one of their issues does, indeed, have a price.

They have a ton of stuff, available on vinyl, CDs, and/or downloads, including material by Coltrane, Stan Getz, Thelonious Monk, Dave Brubeck, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, and many more. Perhaps I am the last one on the  Jazz Collector site to know about them, but I am certainly tempted to check them out and report back here. Perhaps Coltrane Live in Finland, a double vinyl? Or Dexter Gordon and Donald Byrd, a Berlin Studio session from 1963? Just going on their site, I was feeling I could be sliding down a rabbit hole of good and interesting music. And, of course, this being the week of Black Friday in the U.S., everything seems to be on sale.

I also discovered something called the Muse Master Edition Series. They don’t seem to have their own web site yet, but it looks to me like there are at least five reissues, available at places like Acoustic Sounds or elsewhere. Titles are by Roy Brooks, Kenny Barron, Carlos Garnett, Woody Shaw, and Joe Chambers. None of these interests me, but if they get deeper into the catalogue, I’m sure there will be something that’s intriguing. That’s just the way it goes, sometimes.

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