Tennessee Williams on Stage & Screen in New York -Festival Begins December 9th
Some Like It Wilder: The Life and Controversial Films of Billy Wilder - Coming in February
5 Chillers in the Universal Cult Horror Collection on DVD
Robert Redford in Downhill Racer on DVD
Ballast - Lance Hammer's Critically Acclaimed Drama
Z - Costa-Gavras's Oscar-winning Thriller on DVD

The Bing Crosby CBS Recordings 1954-56 (Mosaic Records Limited Edition Collection) - A 7-CD Set Coming in November

“Like buried treasure reclaimed from the past, this remarkable set is like no other Bing Crosby collection ever released. Here is the great crooner and a quartet led by his longtime accompanist Buddy Cole, occasionally augmented by a few wind instruments, in a thesaurus of 160 songs recorded in the most informal of circumstances at 15 sessions, during a period (1954-56) when Bing was in exceptionally good voice. Most of these performances haven’t been heard on records at all, except by ardent collectors; many tracks will be new even to them—the audio quality will be a happy surprise to all. The masters have been safely kept these many years in the majestic Crosby home in Hillsborough, CA, by Bing’s widow, Kathryn Crosby, and are now collected for the first time by Mosaic in participation with the Bing Crosby Estate for The Bing Crosby CBS Recordings 1954-56. It is a bounty to be savored.

Here in full flower is the tensile suppleness, the canny informality of the Crosby voice, which Louis Armstrong memorably described as “a mellow quality...like gold being poured out of a cup.” Freely roaming through an anthology of mostly first-class tunes, he shapes and finesses the melodies, detailing each phrase, finding import in each lyric. You can hear the pleasure he takes in his vocal equipment, in low notes that shimmer like deep waters, in his occasional use of the upper mordent — a technique of turning a note on its heel that Crosby had made his signature in the early 1930s, and then largely abandoned in the intervening years. One reason he felt so comfortable is that his accompanists suited him to a golf tee. Some backings are so tight and responsive they sound as though they had been rehearsed over many days.

For many of us, Bing’s jazz-themed albums of the 1950s have long stood out as defining moments in an outstanding window of time when Bing seemed on the verge of luminous renewal as a recording artist…This set increases the mid-50s Crosby trove exponentially. More than half a century has passed, but this is an inheritance that was well worth waiting for.”
– Gary Giddins, edited from liner notes (Gary Giddins is the author of Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams)

Mosaic Records was launched in 1983 and was the first company devoted exclusively to reissuing jazz recordings in limited-edition boxed sets. It began with a proposal for the complete, definitive boxed sets of significant artists like Thelonious Monk and continues to this day with recent releases by artists such as Benny Goodman and Louis Armstrong Mosaic collections have garnered 5 Grammy nominations. All Mosaic collections are presented with the respect and love that the great art contained within demands from the accompanying full-size booklet that features newly commissioned biographies and musical analysis and rare and unpublished photographs printed in a rich duo-tone process to restoring the sound quality to the best you've ever heard.
Visit the Official Mosaic web site.

Bing Crosby (1903-77), born in Tacoma and raised in Spokane, WA, grew up surrounded by music and first performed professionally as a drummer and vocalist with a local band “The Musicaladers”. Crosby next traveled to Los Angeles and toured as one third of The Rhythm Boys with “The King of Jazz” Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra. By December 1926, the influence of his life-long friend Louis Armstrong had begun to forever change how Crosby interpreted songs. Over his 50-year recording career, Crosby sang just about every type of song, but his roots were in jazz and this new collection displays those roots like no other Crosby release ever has.

In these tracks, both new and long-time Crosby fans will discover how Bing Crosby and jazz are inseparable. Listen and enjoy!

For more information on Bing, watch this preview on YouTube. and visit www.BingCrosby.com or email info@BingCrosby.com. You can also follow Bing on Facebook and Twitter.