Jazz Festival, Vol. 2

Another installment in the Storyville films' small series (duology) of jazz dvds concentrates on swing (first DVD was all dixieland/trad jazz).Ellington's orchestra is simply marvelous, with plethora of giants in its ranks (Johnny Hodges, Harry "America's No 1 baritone saxophone" Carney, Ray nance, Cat Anderson, Paul "Tex" Gonsalves, Sam Woodyard - to name just a few...).My only (small) complaint is that Bobby Hackett's film was split between two DVDs: I can appreciate that that enabled the second DVD to be mostly about swing, but if the Michael Bryan's swing-group film was cut in half instead, the dvds would be better ballanced from the quality point of view...This is a must for all Ellington fans - his band's performance is indispensable, Hackett's band (with Urbie Green-tb, Bob Wilbur-cl...) is maybe even better than on "Vol 1" and Mike Bryan's group with great white tenorist George Auld is a fine example of benny goodman-ish type of swing in the 60s.And yes, these two dvds are not recorded on a festival - they're five beautifully restored jazz films with stereo sound.For first DVD see :  Jazz Festival, Vol. 1