Armstrong Complete RCA Set '97 vs. '01 edition.

[captainwrong]

Ok, I think I have this right that the Complete RCA set for Armstrong came out in 1997 and then again in 2001. Other than packaging, is there any difference? I was lucky enough to get the '97 recently for a steal ($8) and just curious if I'm missing anything on the newer set.

[J.A.W.]

The earlier set suffered from noise reduction (and sounded dead to me); maybe the newer set doesn't - though I doubt it, they probably just reissued the older one.

Edited February 9, 2010 by J.A.W.

[AllenLowe]

I think they're both the same, though I'm not sure - you're right about the noise reduction - they used some weird sytstem that you can hear "breathe" - I have a feeling it was no-noise, because the Sony Emmett Miller set, which was done with no-noise definitely, has the same weird problem, the sound kind od recedes and then comes back.

See if you can find the old French Black and White gatefold LP "The Young Louis." It has a lot of the same material, excellent sound.

[J.A.W.]

See if you can find the old French Black and White gatefold LP "The Young Louis." It has a lot of the same material, excellent sound.

Those French gatefold LPs were reissued on three 2CD-sets in the RCA "Jazz Tribune" series, with the same titles: The Young Louis (1930-1933), From the Big Band to the All Stars (1946-1956) and Louis Armstrong at Town Hall The Complete Town Hall Concert, 17 May 1947.

Edited February 9, 2010 by J.A.W.

[captainwrong]

It's CEDAR, IIRC. Too bad those French LPs aren't likely to show up at Disc Replay any time soon.

[J.A.W.]

It's CEDAR, IIRC.

Yep, the earlier Complete... box was CEDAR-ized.

[colinmce]

Anyone know where I can get this set for a decent price? Or is the $40 being asked on Amazon about the best I can do?

I suppose that's not so bad for 4 discs of great music, but I still feel like I could do better.

[Brownian Motion]

I love those old Victor sides. My dad had a few of them on Blue Bird 78s--High Society, Snowball, Sweet Sue, A Got a Right to Sing the Blues. The first jazz LP I ever bought was "A Rare Batch of Satch" which featured Louis' output from this era. Is there anything more lovely than "When it's Sleepy Time Down South" on Victor?

[jazzbo]

Great music, worth 40 dollars.

[Chuck Nessa]

I am happy with the '97 set and will live with that.

[J.A.W.]

Great music, worth 40 dollars.

Great music indeed, but sonically there are better alternatives in my view:

Young Louis Armstrong

From the Big Band to the All Stars

The Complete Town Hall Concert

Edited February 10, 2010 by J.A.W.

[Chuck Nessa]

Never had those sets but never thought the series transfer were "the shit". They were ok, but...

[J.A.W.]

Never had those sets but never thought the series transfer were "the shit". They were ok, but...

Well, to me they sound better than the 4CD-set, which, as Allen confirmed above, really suffers from noise reduction artefacts.

[jazzbo]

Well, neither is perfect as far as I'm concerned. I hear reverb in the Jazz Tribunes that I don't want to hear. Those Jazz Tribunes may be harder and more expensive to find.

I've said this before, but I worked on having a flexible system and not obsessing so much on remasterings. . . I can get them all to sound good enough to just enjoy the music.

This music is well worth having, however one can.

[J.A.W.]

Well, neither is perfect as far as I'm concerned. I hear reverb in the Jazz Tribunes that I don't want to hear.

I didn't say that the Jazz Tribune sets were perfect; they're not, far from it, but I really hate those noise reduction artefacts on the 4CD-set - that's something I don't want to hear.

To each their own.

Those Jazz Tribunes may be harder and more expensive to find.

Not necessarily - see the links I posted earlier; not all of them are expensive from private Amazon sellers.

Edited February 10, 2010 by J.A.W.

[jazzbo]

Yeah to each their own. Added reverb really bothers me as much as the NR seems to bother you. I can deal with that better. My "Radial" speakers help me.

I kept one of the Jazz Tribunes as it has more of the Town Hall Concert than the box. And that's a great concert.

Anyway, this is not the Hoffman forum. The music is great! I really enjy this period of Armstrong.

Edited February 10, 2010 by jazzbo

[J.A.W.]

Anyway, this is not the Hoffman forum.

The fact that this is not the Hoffman forum doesn't mean that sound quality can't be discussed. That forum's got nothing to do with this discussion here.

As with reverb, you can't remove noise reduction artefacts that are "on the disc", whatever system you have.

Edited February 10, 2010 by J.A.W.

[Chuck Nessa]

The Captain asked about differences between 2 packages. All this other stuff is beyond his request.

Guess it is difficult staying on topic.

[jazzbo]

Anyway, this is not the Hoffman forum.

The fact that this is not the Hoffman forum doesn't mean that sound quality can't be discussed. That forum's got nothing to do with this discussion here.

As with reverb, you can't remove noise reduction artefacts that are "on the disc", whatever system you have.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I didn't say that I could remove NR artifacts. It's just that my speakers are not of a conventional front-firing only design, and their presentation allows this material to sound better to me than the material with added reverb. I can make changes too to the tonal balance that helps "enliven" the sound. I've learned to covet this flexibility; it makes me less a prisoner of a cd's sonic signature.

Captain Wrong, my apologies if I've contributed to the thread going astray. I don't think there's a difference between the two editions of this set, and I think the price is okay, and the music is great.

[J.A.W.]

Anyway, this is not the Hoffman forum.

The fact that this is not the Hoffman forum doesn't mean that sound quality can't be discussed. That forum's got nothing to do with this discussion here.

As with reverb, you can't remove noise reduction artefacts that are "on the disc", whatever system you have.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I didn't say that I could remove NR artifacts. It's just that my speakers are not of a conventional front-firing only design, and their presentation allows this material to sound better to me than the material with added reverb. I can make changes too to the tonal balance that helps "enliven" the sound. I've learned to covet this flexibility; it makes me less a prisoner of a cd's sonic signature.

Captain Wrong, my apologies if I've contributed to the thread going astray. I don't think there's a difference between the two editions of this set, and I think the price is okay, and the music is great.

As I said, to each their own. By the way, I know "artifact" is the spelling many Americans use, but the original spelling is "artefact", from the ablative "arte" of the Latin noun "ars" (= art).

As for this thread going off-topic, I also apologize, but it's not the first time it happens on this forum and most of the time people don't seem to mind

Finally, I also agree that the music is great and that's always the main thing.

Edited February 10, 2010 by J.A.W.

[J.A.W.]

Ok, I think I have this right that the Complete RCA set for Armstrong came out in 1997 and then again in 2001. Other than packaging, is there any difference? I was lucky enough to get the '97 recently for a steal ($8) and just curious if I'm missing anything on the newer set.

I just found a few details on Amazon - the 2001 set uses the masterings of the earlier box for most songs, but a few songs were remastered in 2001, so there are a few differences if the info on Amazon is correct.

Edited February 10, 2010 by J.A.W.

[captainwrong]

Hey, I got the answer I needed. Thanks guys. Feel free to take this thread wherever you wish.

And the bottom line is, this is some wonderful music which should be part of your collection in whatever form you prefer. I'm perfectly happy with the '97, especially for what I paid. I was just more concerned about major differences such as extra tracks and drastically improved sound, though in my so far casual listening of my set, it sounds fine to me.

[mjzee]

I have the studio material here, from our Andorran friends. I picked it up from Berkshire Record Outlet on sale; I think it was $3/disc.

When I was a teenager, my first real introduction to Louis was the summer he died, 1971. About 2 weeks after he died, RCA (I don't know how they did it) had in the stores a 2-LP set that was a retrospective of his RCA material. It had a white cover and was titled 1900-1971. I loved the '30's material, wasn't that crazy about the '40's, but throughout it all was Louis's personality.

[gmonahan]

I have the studio material here, from our Andorran friends. I picked it up from Berkshire Record Outlet on sale; I think it was $3/disc.

When I was a teenager, my first real introduction to Louis was the summer he died, 1971. About 2 weeks after he died, RCA (I don't know how they did it) had in the stores a 2-LP set that was a retrospective of his RCA material. It had a white cover and was titled 1900-1971. I loved the '30's material, wasn't that crazy about the '40's, but throughout it all was Louis's personality.

I had that 2-lp set too. I liked the 40s stuff better than the 30s stuff! Different tastes. Always particularly loved "Jack-Armstrong Blues," and, of course, Teagarden's majestic feature on "St. James Infirmary" from the Town Hall Concert from that period. What an amazing performance that was!

gregmo

[tatifan]

Whether RCA used No-Noise or Cedar is in itself not the determining factor on NR, it's the degree to which it is utilized. Back in the day when these things were trumpeted on cd packaging I think many made up their mind what "cedarized" transfers sounded like. The fact is that 99% of transfer engineers today use Cedar or a relative of it, but the better PR is to leave off mentioning this, because of the bad rap early over-use of the program caused. I've worked a bit with Cedar de-clicking (relatively hard to screw up) and de-noise (gotta be careful with this....sort of like trying to remove cream from coffee!), and if you stay clear of the threshold were artifacts are audible, then the tools have been useful and not harmful. Problem is putting this equipment in the hands of engineers that don't know what music and/or recordings should sound like.

IMHO, the French B/W series, at the time, sounded pretty good on the lp issues, not so hot on the cd versions, which seemed to have an additional layer of poor eq added to what were already somewhat filtered sounding transfers. Overly squashing the high end was the way many engineers of that era (before decent computer-based de-clicking and de=noising) covered up the noise underneath.

Sorry about the tech rant....yes it's about the music, but may as well get the sound right while we're at it, right?