John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 5.84 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 2.57 Gb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 122 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1991 Prestige / Fantasy | 16PCD-4405-2
Jazz / Hard Bop / Modal Jazz / Saxophone

The two and a half years represented in this mammoth collection made up a period of great activity and development for young John Coltrane. It was a time in which he worked in the Miles Davis Quintet, then joined Thelonious Monk for his historic Five Spot engagement, and then took his place in the legendary 1958 Miles Davis Sextet. It was a time in which he grew from a somewhat promising tenor player to a supernova about to burst upon the jazz world. It was also a span during which Trane traveled with great regularity to the original New Jersey location of the Rudy Van Gelder Studio, taking part in no less than 25 lengthy Prestige recording sessions.

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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Coltrane is heard here as leader of his own first albums, as a co-leader, as participant in a number of free-for-all jam sessions, as featured sideman, as frequent collaborator with Red Garland and Donald Byrd–actually in all his Prestige contexts except as a Miles Davis sideman (since those sessions are presently available in the boxed set of Miles's complete recordings for the label). There are 125 selections on these 16 compact discs, totaling almost 1100 minutes of music, an invaluable segment of the full story of one of the truly great creative jazz artists of all times.

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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John Coltrane: The Prestige Recordings chronicles the first great segment of the master's career. The sixteen discs in this mammoth set were all recorded between 1956 and 1958, when Coltrane was a member of Miles Davis' and then Thelonious Monk's ensembles. It's not the Complete Prestige Recordings because it doesn't include material Coltrane recorded with Davis, which is available in the Prestige Davis box. Nevertheless, it's a feast of great music from an underrated and lesser-known period in Coltrane's musical evolution. Fans of celebrated recordings like Giant Steps and My Favorite Things will find a great deal to love here, especially if they find some of Coltrane's later moves hard to understand and harder to listen to.

The set includes both material Coltrane recorded as a leader and as a sideman. There are innumerable gems here, mostly overlooked, including Soultrane, an album Coltrane named in a 1960 interview as his favorite along with his Blue Note recording, Blue Train. One thing Coltrane lovers will not find much in abundance will be Trane's own compositions, owing to Prestige's confiscatory royalty policy; however, his first record as a leader, Coltrane (not to be confused with the later Impulse recording of the same name), contains some tantalizing hints of what was to come: "Straight Street" and "Chronic Blues."

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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But whether or not he composed these tunes, his playing is superlative throughout. The albums he recorded with other tenor saxophonists, especially Tenor Conclave (with Zoot Sims, Al Cohn, and Hank Mobley) and Interplay for Two Trumpets and Two Tenors (with Bobby Jaspar), are stunning for the comparisons they afford: all of Coltrane's companions are fine players, but the crystalline brilliance and sharpness of Coltrane's tone, and his relentless flow of melodic ideas, make it hard to believe that he's playing the same instrument they're playing. It's the same effect one hears in recordings of Lester Young with the Basie band, or Eric Dolphy with Oliver Nelson: are these guys on the same planet?

Also noteworthy is Dakar, a dark-hued masterpiece Coltrane recorded with two baritone saxophonists, Pepper Adams and Cecil Payne. They set off the sharp edge of his tenor such that it sounds all the brighter, and the songs, by Adams, Teddy Charles, and the incomparable Mal Waldron, are catchy enough to delight on first hearing and profound enough to reward repeated listenings. There are a number of recordings with pianist Red Garland in this package; not to be missed is the marathon session of November 15, 1957, which yielded two Coltrane solos that rank with any that he recorded: "Soul Junction" and "All Morning Long." There's also a rare chance to hear Trane play alto (backing Gene Ammons on tenor), although the alto (which he had played in the Forties) didn't make the revolutionary difference to him that the soprano soon would. He sounds pretty much the same, if higher-pitched, on alto as he does on tenor.

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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Listen to Coltrane's sound as it evolves. The session that yielded the Black Pearls album, and those around it, are fascinating examples of his "sheets of sound" period, when he was playing with startling rapidity and dizzying loquacity. Although he was much criticized during this period, forty years later he sounds pretty far inside, and fairly glorious as well.

The Prestige Recordings is a tremendous introduction not only to Coltrane, but to jazz of the Fifties and, in terms of influence, far beyond. It's pricey, but worth every penny.

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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The 16 CDs in this compendium represent nearly everything that John Coltrane recorded for the Prestige label during a 32-month period between May 7, 1956, and December 26, 1958. What's missing are Coltrane's contributions to the mid-'50s Miles Davis band, which are on the equally exhaustive and highly recommended Davis Chronicle box set released in 1990. Otherwise, listeners are treated to the sessions that produced the seminal long-players Coltrane, Cattin' with Coltrane and Quinichette, Traneing In, Soultrane, Lush Life, Settin' the Pace, Standard Coltrane, Stardust, The Believer, Black Pearls, Bahia, and The Last Trane – all of which highlight the artist as either a leader or co-leader. Not included in that list are an additional 19 albums that boast Coltrane's involvement as a support musician. The music is presented primarily in a chronological fashion – commencing with a pair of May 1956 outings with pianist Elmo Hope and tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins. Wrapping things up are five tunes cut the day after Christmas of 1958 alongside trumpeter Freddie Hubbard. Coltrane's legend is ingrained in the grooves of such indispensable entries as "How Deep Is the Ocean?" flanked by tenor saxophonists Zoot Sims, Hank Mobley, and Al Cohn – as originally heard on Tenor Conclave. There is also the Tadd Dameron-commanded "Soultrane" and the definitive "The Way You Look Tonight," during one of the many Mal Waldron confabs, plus "Undecided," sporting Red Garland at the helm. And who could forget the Great American Songbook selections "Lush Life," "Come Rain or Come Shine," "Lover," "Russian Lullaby," "Why Was I Born?," "Lover Come Back to Me," "Stardust," and "Time After Time"? Accompanying the music is a 32-page liner notes booklet. Inside are a historical essay from Doug Ramsey, a session-by-session breakdown by Carl Woideck (and the occasional notation from producer Orrin Keepnews), and several different cross-references of the contents. Overall, the audio quality is excellent throughout, especially considering that the original tapes were transferred during the infancy of digital audio technology. Since 1991, the majority of the music has been remastered and issued on the individual album titles with even more astonishing results.

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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John Coltrane - The Prestige Recordings (1956-58) [16CD BoxSet] {1991 Prestige Remaster} [repost]

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