Search - Ahmad Jamal :: Priceless Jazz

Five star music / some tracks have substandard sound quality

Eric J. Anderson | Ankeny, Iowa | 12/26/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I own the Japanese pressing of this album (MVCJ-14022), but I have no reason to believe the master used is any different from an American pressing.



The musical selection is good on this Priceless Jazz release. It contains a variety of songs not found on Jamal's other compilation albums, Ahmad's Blues and Cross Country Tour. (Both are excellent collections of Ahmad's classic jazz trio period.) I consider New Rhumba, On Green Dolphin Street, Night Mist Blues, Misty, Whisper Not, essential Ahmad Jamal recordings, and you can get them in one package on Priceless Jazz. Ahmad's clear, clean, spacious jazz stylings are his hallmrk, and those qualities are present on Priceless Jazz in abundance.



Now for the bad news. On Green Dolphin Street has never sounded that good on any MP3 or album cut I've heard. I guess the best source tape is in poor shape. Is it "fake stereo?" It might be. It sounds just a little wobbly in spots.



Track 3, Poinciana, sounds like it came from a tape a generation or two removed from the cleaner reproduction on the Cross Country Tour album. Same recording, same location, but on Priceless Jazz, this song sounds distant and a bit softer than it should.



The Best Thing For You, Night Mist Blues, and Whisper Not, are "needle drops." That is, The producers of this compilation played a vinyl record or acetate and put the result on this CD. Unfortunately, they did not have the courtesy to take out the pops and clicks on the record. This is most evident on Whisper Not, but small ticks will be heard periodically throughout the other two songs.



A vinyl record might be the best source the producers had available when they were compiling tracks for Priceless Jazz. So I don't necessarily fault them for that. But even in 1998 when this CD was released, decent audio editing tools existed so they could have removed the noise. I can do so today on my own computer, if I want to record a vinyl album to CD and take out the pops and clicks. That the producer did not do so on this record is a sign of extreme laziness and a bit of disdain or indifference to the consumer.



In conclusion, the music is great. The recording quality varies a lot from cut to cut. Misty sounds very clean and clear. Others, not so much. And then there is the issue of clicks and pops on tracks 4,5, and 10. If this problem was fixed on the American release, I hope someone will correct me. The tracks are still very listenable, just as an old vinyl album can be very listenable. However, in the CD era, when the technology exists to easily remove these noise artifacts, there isn't really any good excuse for not doing so."