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Bear Family Records® went to the bottom of the shellac box for this Christmas collection.

No jingling bells, no ho-ho's or weird reindeer voices.

Instead, swinging jazz at its best, rousing swing of the '30s and '40s, highly danceable, elegant but cool, performed by seasoned jazz musicians.

Featuring Glenn Miller, Paul Whiteman, Louis Armstrong, Charlie Barnet, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Putney Dandridge, Jimmy Ray, Stew Pletcher, Alvino Rey, Stuff Smith and many others.

Annotations for each song in the liner notes in the accompanying booklet.

When Santa Claus takes off his boots and unpacks the gramophone after his work is done: Bear Family Records® delves deep into the shellac box! No intrusive bells, chumming ho-ho's or strangely distorted reindeer voices: Every year around the same time the displays of the department stores are bending with hastily and often suspiciously similar compiled 'swing' samplers, since "swing is coming back." Our journey through the depths of various shellac racks, however, brought to light quite a number of undiscovered treasures. Thus we could stand up for the true 'Spirit of Swing'. Thrilling music of the '30s and '40s, highly danceable, elegant but cool, performed by expert jazz musicians, at the time pressed onto a mélange of shellac, slate flour, soot and cotton flakes, to be played with a steel needle (or optionally cactus spikes for lower volume) at an unbelievable 78 RPM and .... extremely fragile. 'Windup', by the way, refers to the suitable playback device with a crank; from today's point of view, very sustainable and environmentally friendly!

Big names like Glenn Miller - with a very special Jingle Bells version, recorded live on Dec 24, 1941!!! - Paul Whiteman, Louis Armstrong a.m.o. have expressed themselves in their own way on the subject of Christmas.

For friends of high-quality vinyl, a solid selection of 14 tracks appears on long-playing record, pressed on red vinyl (BAF18074).

Track Listing

Sales Points

• 1 CD with 20 page booklet, 27 tracks. Total playing time approx. 74 min.

Press Quotes

The German archival label presents in its ongoing holiday music series this collection of X-mas treats from the swing era. The ros- ter is packed with all-star orchestra leaders: Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Count Basie (with Helen Humes), Chick Webb (with Ella Fitzgerald), Don Redman, Glenn Miller, Charlie Barnett, Louis Prima, Teddy Wilson, others. There's a jaunty confidence to the music even when Santa-hatted forgotten souls like Putney Dandridge, Bob Chester and Monette Moore take charge. Reefer madness: Johnny Guarnieri's 'Santa's Secret.' Excellent production, liner notes, CD and LP mastering.

     —DownBeat Magazine Dec. 2023

We go deep and far back into the archives with this upbeat Big Band Jazz compilation of Christmas songs from some of the hottest performers of the '30s and '40s. This is not your quintessential Christmas album. This a bona fide early Jazz era compilation that will add some spice and variation to your normal Christmas music line-up for the season. Bear Family Records really went to the bottom of the barrel with this one, and you should be glad they did. This is an unbelievably fantastic record! With iconic and historical acts such as Glenn Miller, Paul Whiteman, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, and many more, this is a holiday music presentation unlike many others in your collection (that is, of course, unless you own the original 78rpm shellac records of these timeless and archaic recordings). Add this album (CD or Vinyl) to your collection, to liven up your Christmas music playlist.

     —TONE Scott, Goldmine Magazine, Nov 28, 2023