The "Complete" Tony Bennett Collection

In 2011, Columbia/Sony finally issued a large boxed set dedicated to arguably today's greatest active vocalist (as of this writing), released after many years of disappointing mishandling of Tony Bennett's vast catalog. Haphazard would be the kindest term I could use when describing the poor planning behind most of the CD's in the TONY BENNETT MASTER SERIES, a colossal botch job, disorganized and feeble in its attempts to bringing this great music to market. The aborted series, in reality, brought only a meager percentage of the singer's output to digital form, leaving most of it unavailable to music buyers.

Then, along comes the "complete" set, which although VERY welcome, is FAR from complete. It actually and deliberately omits dozens of tracks, every one of them previously issued at one time, on commercial releases by Columbia Records and other labels.

WF: The biggest criticism of the Complete set I can offer is that it isn't completely complete. A Bennett collector has compiled a list of 67 tracks that should be in the box but are somehow missing. Some of these are very early singles of rather dreadful outings that could only have been foisted on Bennett by producer Mitch Miller. One can hardly blame Mr. Bennett for being embarrassed by such grisly numbers like "Our Lady of Fatima" and "Madonna, Madonna." Still, when Sony advertises this box as "complete," they ought to mean complete. (Inadvertently, I may be part of the reason why "Fatima" isn't included -- about 12 years ago I played it for Mr. Bennett, who hadn't heard it since 1950, and watched him cringe.) Those awkward baby steps, taped before Bennett had truly found his voice, may be one thing (and, as I've said elsewhere, Bennett is one of those great artists who has something to teach us even in his rare missteps) but there's no explaining why the producers left off one of Bennett's loveliest ballads, "All That Love Went to Waste" from 1973. It's a rare track, and no one probably had a master for it, but it ought to have been accounted for in some fashion. (There are also two discs that are totally wasted -- the albums Mr. Broadway and Sunrise, Sunset should have been left out, since they are merely retreads of material that was previously issued at the time, and every track is duplicated elsewhere in the box.)

The purpose of this blog is to remedy this situation and bring these repressed recordings to light. I have painstakingly collected all the suppressed material and I will post each of the 67 tracks in four separate collections. For those that purchased the new box, this is your chance to complete your Bennett collection.

If you have a good color printer and the correct materials, the posts below have all you need to burn CD's and print the complete artwork for these four volumes. Just burn, print, and pop them into your box to have the REALLY complete Bennett!

PLEASE NOTE THAT THESE VOLUMES DO NOT INCLUDE ANY PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED RECORDINGS: MY OBJECTIVE WAS MERELY TO COLLECT, IN ONE PLACE, COMMERCIAL RECORDS MADE BY TONY BENNETT BUT LEFT OFF THIS BOX. ALL OF THE TRACKS ON THE FOUR VOLUMES HAVE BEEN AVAILABLE BEFORE, EITHER ON VINYL OR CD AND WERE ALL SOLD PUBLICLY... ALTHOUGH MANY OF THEM ARE NOW RARE AND HARD TO FIND.

Feel free to leave your observations and opinions on the Bennett box and this collection in the "comments" section! The "comments" section of each of the below posts is where you will also find the download links to each volume.

DESPITE THE MISSING TRACKS, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THE PURCHASE OF THIS BOX AS IT DOES INCLUDE THE VAST MAJORITY OF TONY BENNETT'S RECORDED OUTPUT:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/tony-bennett-the-complete-collection-tony-bennett/22781702