Track Listing

1. Star Dust - Louis Armstrong & His Orchestra
2. Dead man Blues - Jelly Roll Morton's Red Hot Peppers
3. Dear Old Southland - Noble Sissle & His Orchestra featuring Sidney Bechet
4. Singin' the Blues - Frankie Trumbauer & His Orchestra featuring Bix Beiderbecke
5. St. Louis Blues - Louis Armstrong & His Orchestra
6. The Mooche - Duke Ellington & His Orchestra
7. Hotter Than 'Ell - Fletcher Henderson & His Orchestra
8. King Porter Stomp - Benny Goodman & His Orchestra
9. Begin the Beguine - Artie Shaw & His Orchestra
10. Cotton Tail - Duke Ellington & His Orchestra
11. Jumpin' at the Woodside - Count Basie & His Orchestra
12. Solitude - Billie Holiday with Eddie Heywood & His Orchestra
13. Groovin' High - Dizzy Gillespie featuring Charlie Parker
14. Straight, No Chaser - Thelonious Monk
15. They Can't Take That Away From Me - Sarah Vaughan & Her Trio
16. Take Five - The Dave Brubeck Quartet
17. Doodlin' - Horace Silver & The Jazz Messengers
18. Giant Steps - John Coltrane Quartet
19. So What - Miles Davis Sextet
20. Take The "A" Train - The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #17736 in Music
• Released on: 2000-11-07
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.com
Ken Burns, America's premier documentary filmmaker, scores another hit with his landmark 10-part, 19-hour PBS documentary, Jazz. This sampler is a smaller version of the accompanying five-CD box set, with 22 selections spanning the music's many styles: from Benny Goodman's 1938 classic rendition of "King Porter Stomp" to John Coltrane's immortal "Giant Steps." Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan form a sweeping spectrum of jazz singing with their varying styles. Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker's "Groovin' High," Thelonious Monk's riff blues "'Straight, No Chaser," and Miles Davis's modal masterpiece "So What" are among the music's "greatest hits" compiled here. Louis Armstrong's down-home treatment of Hoagy Carmichael's "Star Dust" and Duke Ellington's rousing "Cotton Tail" show why they are the alpha and the omega of this music. Although the documentary and the sampler omit the avant-garde and Latin jazz, this is, overall, good one-stop shopping for those just getting in the groove. --Eugene Holley Jr.

Customer Reviews

Great Compilation - Totally Recommend
In one CD with 20 tracks you'll take the musical jazz journey from 1926 to 1959. From the early New Orleans sound of Jelly Roll Morton to the swing of Louis and Duke and Count Basie, vocals of Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan, and the evolution of jazz with Thelonious, Coltrane and Miles. Hard to ask for much more in an overview of American Jazz than you'll get here. If Jazz is new to you this is an excellent introduction, or if you're a fan like me you'll appreciate this "best of" collection.

A Perfect Jazz CD for the Beginner ...or for the Professiona
My first venture into jazz was the Smithsonian's History of Jazz 5 volume LP edition. 25 years and some 1,000 CDs later, I am still collecting and still enjoying. This CD brought to me as musch joy and as much understanding of Jazz as my first purchase. I felt as a beginner again. If you love Jazz or if you want to understand Jazz, get this one.

Best of the best
If you can't afford the price tag on the 5 CD set then this is for you ! Although any serious jazz collector would have most of these songs it is still a great collection that takes the listener through time and a trip to W52nd Street in New York City. The sound quality is excellent, especially on the older songs. If anything this CD will make you hungry for more Coltrane, Sachmo, Dizzy and the Count ! Purchase it and you WON'T be dissappointed !