[78-L] National Records

[Dan Van Landingham]

The best sounding Nationals I heard were the ones that Billy Eckstine cut in 1946 with a string section.I
wondered if they were cut at Radio Recorders.I have them somewhere on a Savoy LP called "Mr.B and
the Band".I should replace it with a CD copy as I gave the LP alot of hard use.I bought it new back in 
1978.Prior to that I had a bootleg LP of Eckstine on Alamac I bought new in Denver back in 1975.It was
said to be the only album of the Eckstine band live.I recently found a CD copy of that same album.I got it
off of ebay a couple of years ago.It had a great version of the 1928 song "Together" which had a good tr-
umpet solo by Fats Navarro who was one of my favourites.I was listening to an album of Miles Davis which is a German import.It has no personnel and Davis was in relatively good form but he was no Fats
Navarro in my opinion.I'm also a trumpet player myself although I eventually switched into saxophone se-
ction playing tenor then baritone sax.Navarro,from what I remember via an article in Downbeat in the early
'70s,started out playing tenor in some big band in Key West,Florida.He struck me as a no nonsense kind of
player who didn't clown around the way Dizzy did.Ray Linn was in the orchestra that backed Eckstine on
those late 1946 dates which were cut in the L.A. area as I recall.



________________________________
From: Geoffrey Wheeler <dialjazz at verizon.net>
To: 78-l at klickitat.78online.com
Sent: Sun, April 4, 2010 11:35:05 AM
Subject: [78-L] National Records

Dan Van Landingham comments: “I was paraphrasing a writer named Charlie
Gillette who wrote a book on the history of Atlantic Records and he 
alluded to National Records and its
founder Al Green.He described National's records as being a mixture of 
manure and gravel.”

I was told years ago, that the owner of National Records had another 
business that produced some kind of material  he decided to use for 
pressing his records. I forget what the material was said to be but 
everyone acknowledged it resulted in quite inferior playing surfaces. I 
have quite a few Nationals; some play better than others.
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