Old Wine, New Bottles: Record Collecting, Jazz Reissues, and the Jazz Tradition

ABSTRACT This article argues that reissues – whether in the form of repackaged and re-released recordings that have gone out of print, recordings republished in new media with the change of playback technology, or collected as historical compilation albums – form a hub of activities by jazz collectors, critics, producers, and historians – roles often filled by the same person. As curated aural texts, reissues, in recurring fashion over jazz’s recorded past, form connective tissue for the distorted historical narrative of jazz as representing a “coherent whole.” The article tracks three broad historical moments in which reissues have played a crucial role in constructing the “jazz tradition” commonly portrayed in textbooks: (1) the rise of the reissues market through Commodore Records, (2) the pairing of collected tracks on compilation albums with a flourishing jazz history book trade in the postwar era, and (3) combining nostalgia for music of past decades with the advent of new recording and playback technology, and the move to remastered, completist collectors' series exemplified by Mosaic Records at the turn of the 21st century. The article ends with speculation about how the most recent uptick in reissuing might aid in disrupting the “jazz tradition” edifice.