10 albums a day #23

Bela Fleck and the Flecktones - Greatest Hits of the 20th Century (1999, CD)
Billie Holiday - The Complete Decca Recordings 1944-50 (1991, double CD)
Charles Mingus - The Millennium Collection: The Best of Charles Mingus (2007, CD)
Chick Corea - The Leprechaun (1975, LP)
Chuck Mangione - Feels So Good (1977, cassette)
David S. Ware - Birth of a Being (1979, mp3 download)
Dinah Washington - In Tribute (undated, LP), untitled (undated, LP)
The Dixie Dregs - Off the Record (1988, mini-CD), The Millennium Collection: The Best of the Dixie Dregs (2002, CD)

Bela Fleck may be the world's only jazz banjo player. This is really cool stuff, and I should have more of it. I got this one from yourmusic.com, and his new album recently turned up there so I put it in the queue.

The Billie Holiday set is a boxed set that includes a book with lots of information. I didn't have anything else by her (still don't), so I thought this would help round out the collection. It has pretty much everything she recorded during those years when she was with Decca Records, including alt takes and some studio chatter. I can only listen to her in small doses. I have listened to this entire set straight through, but it's not something I'd ever want to do again. Hearing her turn up in the shuffle one song at a time is great, though.

Yourmusic.com is pretty good at stocking compilations such as The Millennium Collection series, and every now and then I go through their whole jazz catalog and put stuff into the queue that looks good. That's how I got the Mingus CD. That's all I have by him, so far.

The Chuck Mangione tape is the first jazz album I ever bought, but I don't think I bought it until a few years after it had been released. I remember talking with our band director about it, so based on which band director it was, that must have been when I was in 10th grade (if I remember the band director chronology correctly). This is another tape that I would have expected to have worn out, but it never did. If the only thing you've ever heard by him is the shortened radio version of "Feels So Good," you should hear more before trying to form an opinion about his music.

The David S. Ware album was downloaded from Kathleen Loves Music. He is a tenor saxophonist. His music is a little too "free" for my tastes, but I'm still kind of going in all directions when it comes to jazz, and I'll take whatever I can find, especially if it's free.

The two Dinah Washington albums were inherited from my mother-in-law. I wasn't really familiar with her before, but I am a fan now. These two were released by Roulette (which was her record label) after she died, still trying to make money off her, I suppose. Since ripping these, I have added a couple of her CDs to my yourmusic.com queue.

The Dixie Dregs (later just The Dregs) are another "fusion" group (I am beginning to dislike that term, hence the quotes). They mix jazz with rock in general but also with some sounds of southern rock in there. Another group that I would like to get more of. The Off the Record mini-CD was a promo deal that was packaged with an issue of Keyboard magazine back then; it has two musical tracks plus an interview with the group. I think it was a promotional thing for the Ensoniq ESQ-1 synthesizer. The other CD is another of the Millenium Collection series, and is a better overall view of their whole career.

Album count: 222.