miss annabel lee

April 19, 2010 8:57 AM

some recommendations for music from the roaring twenties...

I would like to know if anyone knows any good websites or names of compilation albums of old 78's music from the roaring twenties/thirties, rather like you hear on the singing detective or even fallout 3 - im not asking for the artists from those works, but more as a general pointer to the type of music im looking for.

I'm starting to get hooked on these kind of records.

thanks in advance.

posted by sgt.serenity to Media & Arts (13 answers total)

1920s Radio Network.
posted by JanetLand at 9:14 AM on April 19, 2010

Red Hot Jazz
Jazz Roots
Old Time Jazz Online (28632 tunes available for download)
posted by paulsc at 9:19 AM on April 19, 2010

Best answer: Red Hot Jazz. Don't miss Irving Aaronson, The Five Harmaniacs, Fred Hall and his Sugar Babies, Red Nichols and his Five Pennies, the California Ramblers, Harry Reser and Tom Stacks and his Jumping Jacks, and the University Six!

Aaron1912 has some amazing stuff. Be sure to follow the side links! You can totally get lost in the 78s archive at Archive.org.
posted by aquafortis at 9:20 AM on April 19, 2010

Best answer: Vitaphone Varieties has both songs from old Vitaphone film 'soundtracks' and recordings from regular 78s.
posted by bubukaba at 9:41 AM on April 19, 2010

Louis Armstrong and his Hot Fives and his Hot Sevens. Sorry about the RealAudio files.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:00 AM on April 19, 2010

Belfers collection of cylinders (a whole bunch of digitized cylinders). They have 34 popular songs from the 20s which can be downloaded as mp3s.
posted by Kattullus at 10:36 AM on April 19, 2010

It's a huge collection, and as such isn't limited to 20s jazz, but if you have the time, you could sift through this collection of recordings from 78s.

Also, since someone else mentioned archive.org, there's a ton of Glenn Miller recordings (sometimes with the Andrews Sisters) in the Archive, such as this one. A search for "Glenn Miller" in the Open Source Audio collection turns up dozens upon dozens of recordings.
posted by hatta at 11:04 AM on April 19, 2010

It isn't a site or a collection, but you would have lots of luck if you found yourself a copy of the fine collection of Philip Larkin's wonderful Jazz criticism entitled Larkin's Jazz. The 20s/30s were really Larkin's favorite, and reading through that book will likely give you some great things to check out.
posted by koeselitz at 11:45 AM on April 19, 2010

Response by poster: Sorry about the RealAudio files

I know, I know, the only format more redundant than a 78 record - i have nothing to play it with, and would rather be torn limb from limb than use realplayer.

but maybe thats just me.

Thanks anyway.
posted by sgt.serenity at 10:21 AM on April 20, 2010

Best answer: VLC should play .rm files. You should also look into Dust to Digital and Joe Bussard's collections. The latter has what might be the largest collection (~25,000) of 78s in the world.
posted by The White Hat at 11:25 AM on April 20, 2010

I came in here to recommend Satchmo's Hot 5 and 7, but Cool papa Bell beat me to it. It don't get any better!
posted by Guy_Inamonkeysuit at 3:05 PM on April 20, 2010

Dammit, I mean Thorzdad.

Just woke up from a nap, must still be sleeping...
posted by Guy_Inamonkeysuit at 3:06 PM on April 20, 2010

Response by poster: really ? vlc plays .rm files ?

what a bloomin fantastic piece of software vlc media player is - i love it to bits.
posted by sgt.serenity at 6:07 PM on April 20, 2010