New Orleans Jazz (Remastered)

Sixteen tracks recorded between May 1928 and June 1929 with the Apex Club Orchestra, featuring Earl Fatha Hines at the piano and Joe Poston on alto sax. Most of these titles overlap with the Vocalion sides reissued on Decca's Apex Blues, but the running times vary considerable in some instances, by as much as 30 seconds or more ("Every Evening I Miss You"), though usually only four or five seconds, and as little as one, indicating that these are variant studio takes. In any case, the quality of the sound and the performances are impeccable, and four of the numbers here don't appear on the Decca compilation at all. The notes tell more about the Hot Club of Paris, under whose auspices this disc is issued, than about Noone, but the price is right and the music is a pleasure. As a bonus, the last track, "Chattanooga Stomp," is a live recording (in astonishingly good sound) by the King Oliver Creole Jazz Band from 1923, featuring Noone on clarinet and Louis Armstrong on cornet; on its own, this cut is worth the price of the disc.