Scott Joplin Music

I red the comments of two other people who have bought this 4 CD BOX SET and it is not really so bad. I will even add that there are some excellent tunes. However, I must agree with the fact that few tunes seem to have been recorded 40 or 50 years ago, mainly when you hear the scratches of an old turntable but it is just 2 or 3 tunes. Furthermore, if you do not know American music, it is a good BOX SET to buy if you consider that you received 4 CD for 4$ including 100 tunes. On these 4 CD, I have heard some orchestration that I have never heard before and I consider that they are different but interesting. Any way, after hearing these 100 tunes, you will say to yourself that you like this tune, this other tune, this other tune and so on and you will be able to buy a more expensive CD with the tunes that you like. However, I have bought many CDs in the last few weeks and as you know, there are always some tunes that you like and some tunes that you do not like on every CD that you will buy. So, don't buy it at 25$ but at 4 or 5$ dollars, it is a very good choice for 100 tunes.

We were disappointed with this CD, but for the price I guess we can't expect much. I didn't care for the new style presentation of the songs. I like a more traditional rendering.

You get what you pay for. The singers put their own spin on the singing of each song. If you didn't hear the words you would not recognize some of them. Even some of the music sounds like a bad recording of music played on a turntable. Definitely not worth the price.

I wish this review had been here when I was thinking of purchasing it. I guess you get what you pay for. If you are thinking of buying this, you are better off recording your own CDs (or at least buying one that you can listen to a sampling of the songs). This album includes songs that were mere recordings of the songs playing on an old record player. It's almost so unbelievable that it is funny.

I also bought this album for the Anderson Concerto, and was delighted with both it and the other selections on this disc.

Superb!!!

I bought this CD for the Leroy Anderson Concerto, and I was not disappointed. In the several months since, I have enjoyed it many times over. Though Leroy Anderson was known mostly for his sprightly and imaginative little pieces such as Syncopated Clock and The Typewriter, he was certainly capable of writing a beautiful theme or two, and of good musical composition and great orchestration, and it all shows in this piece. What a talented man, and what a great addition this concerto is to American music. The rest of the CD is also very listenable. Altogether, it's a worthy purchase.

I enjoyed the Anderson Piano Concerto. It is tuneful and upbeat. It has its moments of technical prowess, but I thought the pianist hit a lot of wrong notes which upon repeat listening, causes annoyance.
I would like to hear another recording with a better pianist, or at least one that is edited. It is too good a concerto to get this rendering.

The featured selection on this CD is the premier recording of Leroy Anderson's piano concerto. It is the reason to acquire the CD, as the other selections are fairly familiar and are available on numerous recordings.

To the extent that he is well-known at all, Anderon's fame is based upon a series of pleasant, little, novelty pieces, composed primarily for the Boton Pops. The piano concerto shows that he was also capable of creating longer, sustained works. It is an interesting and very accessable work with a distinctly American flavor.

Charles Thompson was a contemporary of Jelly Roll Morton and James P. Johnson, and was one of the leading figues of the second generation of St. Louis ragtime pianists.

This album, made up of live recordings from the early 1960s, finds Thompson in reasonable form, playing some of his best known pieces plus a few standards. His powers had declined a little from his 1948-49 American Music recordings, but he was still able to play in an entertaining fashion. Many of the performances are rather short, but these are historic recordings by a little known but important figue in ragtime.

Delmark is to be commended for this release: let's hope they re-issue the rest of the Euphonic back catalogue. Anyone interested in ragtime and early jazz should consider buying this CD.