Legacy Announces Complete Album Collection Box Sets for Etta James, The Brecker Brothers and Sarah Vaughan

These three
new entries follow up the first 19 box sets in the series, released
through PopMarket.com in 2011 – 2012. The previous titles focused on the
careers of the Dave Brubeck Quartet, Stanley Clarke, Miles Davis
(2009), George Duke, Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon, Billie Holiday, The
Mahavishnu Orchestra, Wynton Marsalis, Charles Mingus, Thelonious Monk,
Return To Forever, Woody Shaw, Wayne Shorter, Grover Washington Jr.,
Weather Report 197-1975 and Weather Report 1971-1975 (all on
Columbia/Legacy); and Paul Desmond and Nina Simone (on RCA/Legacy).

As
the dominant jazz record label for most of the 20th century, Columbia
was home to a myriad of leading figures during the LP era, and into the
digital age. Each multi-disc box set contains the artist’s entire album
output during their original label tenure (Columbia, Epic, RCA, Arista,
and so on), or focuses on some aspect of their output. Each album is
packaged in a replica mini-LP sleeve reproducing that LP’s original
front and back cover artwork. Where applicable, the albums in each box
include the bonus tracks that have been released on the various Legacy
expanded CD editions over the years. Booklets are included with each box
set, containing new liner notes essays and complete discographical
information, including any bonus material.

For example, THE
COMPLETE PRIVATE MUSIC BLUES, ROCK ‘N’ SOUL ALBUMS COLLECTION from Etta
James digs into the archive for its bonus disc, a live session recorded
in San Francisco in 1981, and issued on Private Music in 1994. Previous
box sets on Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon, the original Mahavishnu Orchestra,
Woody Shaw, and Weather Report have all included bonus discs of
non-album music, most of which was previously unreleased.

The box
sets in the Complete Album Collections series have been produced by
Grammy Award®-winning and Grammy Award®-nominated Legacy producers
Richard Seidel, Michael Cuscuna, Michael Brooks, Didier Deutsch and Bob
Belden. All packaging has been supervised by Grammy Award®-winning
former Legacy Vice President of Jazz Marketing Seth Rothstein, and art
directed by award-winning designer Edward ODowd, who has worked on more
than 150 CD packages in various genres.

Virtually all of the CDs
in these box sets have been remastered by Sony Senior Mastering Engineer
Mark Wilder. He has received seven Grammy Award® nominations and 3
Grammy Awards® in his nearly 25 years at Sony. All of the jazz CDs in
the Complete Album Collections are produced from the most up-to-date and
best-sounding masters available.

The new titles in the series are as follows:

THE BRECKER BROTHERS – THE COMPLETE ARISTA ALBUMS COLLECTION (Arista/Legacy)

Arista
Records established itself as a quintessential New York label in
January 1975, just a few months after going into business, when Clive
Davis added one of the city’s most important homegrown jazz partnerships
to the roster, starring Randy Brecker on trumpet (b. 1945) and Michael
Brecker on tenor saxophone (1949-2007). The brothers were raised outside
Philadelphia and attended Indiana University before settling in New
York to make their way as journeymen on the jazz circuit.

Individually,
Randy came to prominence on the first Blood Sweat & Tears LP on
Columbia, Child Is Father To the Man (1967), then left the next year to
pursue session work. Randy’s next major band was Dreams (on Columbia in
1970-71, featuring Billy Cobham and Will Lee), where he and Michael
comprised the horn section with trombonist Barry Rogers. After a stint
in Larry Coryell’s Eleventh House, Randy was finally rejoined by Michael
for the Brecker Brothers, which became a New York dynasty over the
course of five solid studio LPs and one live album (Heavy Metal Be-Bop)
at Arista between 1975 and 1981.

Brecker Brothers LPs strode the
line between hard jazz and more commercial nods to rock, funk, Latin,
and (occasionally) disco beats. Lineups were flexible over the years,
including (at various times) guitarists Bob Mann, Steve Khan, Barry
Finnerty, David Spinozza, and Hiram Bullock; bassmen Will Lee, Neil
Jason, Marcus Miller, and Tony Levin; keyboardist Don Grolnick; and
drummers Harvey Mason, Chris Parker, Steve Gadd, and Steve Jordan.

In
person, the Brecker Brothers Band simply could not be beat, as heard on
the Blue Montreux and Blue Montreux II festival recordings (of 1978,
released ’79), “featuring a group of friends that was an offshoot of
both the Brecker Bros. Band and Mike Mainieri’s White Elephant, ” as
Randy notes in his brief introduction to the package. “Those were
productive years, ” he continues. “We were playing on hundreds of
sessions, plus doing our own thing… I think it influenced many who came
after us, and much of this music is still relevant today. We lost
Michael in January of 2007 but I know he would have been thrilled by
this release. During this period he developed his style, which became
emulated by thousands of other saxophonists.”

1. The Brecker Brothers (Arista AL 4037, 1975)

2. Back to Back (Arista AL 4061, 1976)

3. Don’t Stop the Music (Arista AL 4122, 1977)

4. Heavy Metal Be-Bop (Arista AB 4185, 1978)

5. Detente (Arista AB 4272, 1980)

6. Straphangin’ (Arista AL 9550, 1981)

7. Blue Montreux (Arista AB 4224, 1979)

8. Blue Montreux II (Arista AB 4245, 1979)

ETTA JAMES – THE COMPLETE PRIVATE MUSIC BLUES, ROCK ‘N’ SOUL ALBUMS COLLECTION (7 titles, 7 CDs; Private Music/RCA/Legacy)

Born
to teenage single mother Dorothy in Los Angeles, Jamesetta Hawkins
(1938-2012) was in her late fifties when she began recording for Private
Music, one of the most prolific and rewarding associations of her
lifetime in music. The liner notes essay written by two-time Grammy
Award®-winning producer and disc jockey Bob Porter painstakingly and
authoritatively rolls out the arc of the singer’s life. Music was her
calling, from her childhood on bustling Central Avenue to becoming
principal soloist with the St. Paul Baptist Church’s choir, Echoes of
Eden, to hearing Billie Holiday and many others at legendary local
joints like Club Alabam.

A move to San Francisco led to the
start of her first girl group, the Creolettes, and writing one of her
first songs in 1954, the suggestive “Roll With Me, Henry, ” her answer
song to [Hank Ballard and] the Midnighters’ #1 R&B hit “Work With Me
Annie.” That song brought her to the attention of R&B bandleader
Johnny Otis, who changed her name to Etta James, and Modern Records, who
changed her song title to “The Wallflower, ” her first #1 R&B hit.
Touring coast to coast with ‘the Otis Caravan, ‘ Etta was at the center
of a blues and R&B vortex that was exploding in the 1950s, and led
to Chicago’s Chess Records, where she spent 16 years (1960-76) recording
at a steady, prolific pace. “All I Could Do Was Cry” (1960), Grammy®
Hall Of Famer “At Last” (1961), and “Tell Mama” (1967) were among her
more than two dozen chart singles at Chess, even as she battled a
crushing heroin addiction. Into the late ’70s and ’80s, there were
records for Atlantic, Elektra, Fantasy, and Island, until she finally
landed at Private Music, the last longterm major label affiliation of
her life, where Etta thrived as an award-winning jazz and blues vocalist
par excellence.

The six albums in this box set focus on the
blues-rockin’ side of Etta’s Private Music years, including the Grammy
Award®-winning Let’s Roll (Best Contemporary Blues Album of 2003) and
Blues To The Bone (Best Traditional Blues Album of 2004). There is a
wealth of music here, from her reunion with producer Barry Beckett on
1997’s Love’s Been Rough On Me to the best-selling Life, Love And The
Blues, with its bounty of songs by Willie Dixon, Albert King, Marvin
Gaye, Al Green, Joe Tex and others. Matriarch Of The Blues explores
material by Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Otis Redding, Ray Charles,
Creedence Clearwater Revival, and Leiber-Stoller’s “Hound Dog.”

Burnin’
Down The House showcased the Roots Band of Mike Finnigan and David K.
Matthews on another eclectic program (Dixon, Ellington, Randy Newman,
B.B. King and so on). For good measure, the bonus disc rediscovers a
live date in San Francisco, recorded in 1981, and released on Private
Music in 1994. “And to think, ” Porter’s notes conclude, “it all started
when she was that chubby little girl with light skin and long curly
hair singing with the Echoes Of Eden at St. Paul Baptist Church.”

1. Love’s Been Rough On Me (Private Music, 1997)

2. Life, Love And The Blues (Private Music, 1998)

3. Matriarch Of The Blues (Private Music, 2000)

4. Burnin’ Down The House (Private Music, 2002)

5. Let’s Roll, Grammy Award®-winner (Private Music, 2003)

6. Blues To The Bone, Grammy Award®-winner (RCA Victor, 2004)

7. Bonus Disc: Live From San Francisco (On The Spot/Private Music, recorded 1981, released 1994)

SARAH VAUGHAN – THE COMPLETE COLUMBIA ALBUMS COLLECTION (4 titles, 4 CDs; Columbia/Legacy)

The
very top tier of America’s greatest (and most studied and copied)
female jazz and blues vocalists of the 20th century is where Billie
Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and ‘Sassy’ Sarah Vaughan (1924-1990) are
found. Born in Newark and raised in the church, Vaughan’s voice could
have earned her a career on the classical stage. But popular music lured
her to different stages, where big bands held sway under the leadership
of Earl ‘Fatha’ Hines and (later) Billy Eckstine, Vaughan’s lifelong
mentor.

Early 78 rpm records on the old Musicraft label brought
her to the attention of Columbia in January 1949, when the earliest
session on After Hours With Sarah Vaughan took place, an orchestral date
that Vaughan deftly transcended, her jazz chops taking over. The 1955
LP, “at the dawn of the long-playing era, ” as popular vocal aficionado
Will Friedwald’s notes remind, compiled material from Columbia dates in
1949, ’50, ’51, and ’52, conforming to a template of sorts, “consisting
of well-known standards rendered in what jazz fans would have regarded
as commercial settings.”

Thankfully, Vaughan also recorded with
small jazz combos, most famously the two May 1950 dates which featured
Miles Davis and trombonist Benny Green. Those dates (and two others with
different orchestral lineups) were culled for Sarah Vaughan In Hi-Fi,
her other 1955 Columbia LP, whose first four songs became a litany for
every singer: “East Of The Sun (And West Of The Moon), ” “Nice Work If
You Can Get It, ” “Come Rain Or Come Shine, ” and “Mean To Me.” (The
original 12-song LP turned into a 21-track CD in 1996, with the addition
of “Ooh, What’cha Doin’ To Me” and eight alternate takes.)

Some
three decades later in 1982, after her career had taken Vaughan to the
moon and beyond, she was coaxed into a concert recording at the Dorothy
Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles, with Michael Tilson Thomas conducting
the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a tribute to her favorite composers,
George and Ira Gershwin. Abundance of riches would righteously describe
Gershwin Live!, including the Porgy And Bess medley, two other medleys
that cover nine songs, and other selections ranging from “Sweet And
Low-Down” and “Fascinating Rhythm, ” to ‘The Man I Love.”

Sarah
Vaughan’s final LP under her own name, Brazilian Romance, marked her
return to Columbia in 1987, for a concept album produced by Sergio
Mendes and devoted (mostly) to the songs of Milton Nascimento (who
joined her on vocals) and guitarist-arranger Dori Caymmi. A who’s who of
jazz players were onboard, including soloists Hubert Laws, Tom Scott,
and Ernie Watts. Friedwald notes, “there was still time to create some
Sarah Vaughan classics, such as ‘Nothing Will Be As It Was’ and
‘Photograph.’ Most moving of all is album producer Sergio Mendes’ ‘So
Many Stars, ‘ truly one of the all-time great Vaughan love songs, thanks
partly to an expert lyric by Alan and Marilyn Bergman.”

1. After Hours With Sarah Vaughan (Columbia, 1955)

2. Sarah Vaughan In Hi-Fi (Columbia, 1955)

3. Michael Tilson Thomas / Sarah Vaughan: Gershwin Live! (Sony Classical, 1982)

4. Brazilian Romance (Columbia, 1987)