Review:

on 2012-03-20 CharlesMartel Said:

Bessie Smith was nicknamed the Empress of the Blues and was one of the early pioneers of the the blues jazz crossovers which came to dominate the forties. A young Louis Armstrong played cornet on "Careless Love Blues", another W.C. Handy composition. The song has a strong melody which contains one of the oldest black folk melodies from the US. This amply demonstrates the voice which made Smith such an influence on subsequent jazz music.

If you mamage to come across an original ceramic 78 of this, lucky you. But I suggest you don't play it. The pressings of this were frequently poor and the discs were sometimes slightly elliptical rather than a pure circle and the hole in the centre was not exactly dead centre. Plus, recording techniques of the time meant that there were fluctuations in the speed of the recording (remember, these things were hand cranked). The result is that there is a distinct unevenness in the pitch of the sound, especially the voice. Thankfully, Bessie Smith's earliest recordings have been digitally remastered to eradicate these flaws. Whether or not you judge that authentic is up to you, but it does improve the sound.
Rating: 8/10