As many of you know, Maria Conchita Alonso recorded for the AyM Discos branch of A&M back in the mid-'80s. She released at least three LPs and a greatest hits collection that I know of (Philadelphia is not exactly a hotbed of Latin music!), and recorded one track with Herb Alpert, "Noche de Copas." I was introduced to her music on that Miami Pre-Superbowl Latin music special that Herb hosted, and he and Maria performed that song. Shortly thereafter, I managed to find her three albums on cassette. CDs were still a newish technology and vinyl was on its way out, so cassettes during that time were the best stocked format in record stores around here, particularly in the "World Music" sections. It was there that I discovered the Lani Hall Latin albums as well, finding two of hers and her greatest hits package.
One thing I discovered with all of these was my fondness for records produced and/or written by Juan Carlos Calderon and Jose Quintana. These are the two responsible for Herb's FANDANGO album, and they also were the force behind Lani's first Latin album, LANI, and Maria Conchita Alonso's first for the label called MARIA CONCHITA. Listening to those cassettes, I became very fond of these albums -- Maria's singing style taking a bit of getting used to, but ultimately I guess you could call me a fan, and it's all way better than the stuff that passes for pop music these days.
Anyway, sometime in the early-to-mid-'90s, I was delighted to find a Maria Conchita Alonso compilation on CD. It was called GRANDES EXITOS, was on the Capitol/EMI Latin label (under PolyGram Discos), and had 10 of her better tracks on it. I was excited to find this music on a more durable format, but was somewhat disappointed in the overall sound quality. Two tracks in particular bugged me -- the aforementioned "Noche de Copas" and "Acariciame", both seemed like they were missing something -- something in the higher frequencies, giving the CD tracks a rather dull sound to them. When I compared them to the cassette tracks that I'd become familiar with, it was plain to hear that a cymbal track was either missing or eliminated from the CD mix.
About a year or so later, I found another CD package called DE COLECCIÓN and this one had an A&M Records logo on it. 11 tracks on this one, most of the same ones in a slightly different order, and a few different songs. "Good", I thought, "Maybe these used the correct masters." Unfortunately, again, the tracks without the cymbals were on the CD.
A couple of years ago, I finally located all three of Maria's AyM Discos albums on vinyl (thanks to eBay). It confirmed one thing -- that the original vinyl albums also had the cymbals in the audio mix. In fact, I've been meaning to do a transfer to CD of these to replace the ones I did from cassette, but some of the vinyl's splashy "S" sounds have deterred me.
In 1997, the Mercury label released yet another compilation titled HOY Y SIEMPRE. Twelve tracks, again similar material, and again the dull mixes were used.
Flash forward to today. On the way home from work this evening, and after a dinner in our upscale King Of Prussia area, I stopped at the local Tower Records store. I hadn't been there in ages, and it sure looked different. While they had a great selection of DVDs, the CD section had shrunk by a third, with many of the old racks among the missing. I guess the bigger profits are in DVDs these days (but that's a different topic that's been addressed elsewhere). I wandered by the World Music section and was surprised to see a Maria Conchita Alonso tab. (Maybe I shouldn't have been too surprised, since it was in that very store where I found virtually all of the other Maria Conchita Alonso CDs!) There was only one disc in the tabbed section, and it was yet another compilation -- titled LO MEJOR DE MARIA CONCHITA ALONSO. The back of it had an A&M Records logo (along with a Universal Special Products logo) and mentioned that it was a reissue of SP-37019. (Mentioning an old SP# alone was a treat!) The track listing looked familiar to me, and I figured it was the same tracks as one of the other CDs I already had, just with a different title and artwork. We all know that Univer$al is good for that. I was going to ignore it and walk away when I noticed that it was only $7.99. For that price, I could add it to the collection as another A&M oddity.
But, as I listened on the way home, I realized that the mixes were finally right. My compliments to Barry Korkin (I know Steve has mentioned him here) for getting this compilation right and using the correct masters. It would have been easy to just re-use the master from the EMI disc -- the track list is identical, but someone, and I can only guess that it was Mr. Korkin or perhaps Jeff Fura or Lynise Levine, also listed as compilation co-ordinators, should get credit for making this one better than the others.
Once home and online, I find that this particular disc (with a 2000 copyright date) is even cheaper through CDNow, at $6.89. You can't go wrong for that price. The link for the CDNow page is in this post (it's a big, hairy link thingy), so I put it in it's own topic to make this more readable:
http://www.amcorner.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=451
Harry
...longwinded, online...
One thing I discovered with all of these was my fondness for records produced and/or written by Juan Carlos Calderon and Jose Quintana. These are the two responsible for Herb's FANDANGO album, and they also were the force behind Lani's first Latin album, LANI, and Maria Conchita Alonso's first for the label called MARIA CONCHITA. Listening to those cassettes, I became very fond of these albums -- Maria's singing style taking a bit of getting used to, but ultimately I guess you could call me a fan, and it's all way better than the stuff that passes for pop music these days.
Anyway, sometime in the early-to-mid-'90s, I was delighted to find a Maria Conchita Alonso compilation on CD. It was called GRANDES EXITOS, was on the Capitol/EMI Latin label (under PolyGram Discos), and had 10 of her better tracks on it. I was excited to find this music on a more durable format, but was somewhat disappointed in the overall sound quality. Two tracks in particular bugged me -- the aforementioned "Noche de Copas" and "Acariciame", both seemed like they were missing something -- something in the higher frequencies, giving the CD tracks a rather dull sound to them. When I compared them to the cassette tracks that I'd become familiar with, it was plain to hear that a cymbal track was either missing or eliminated from the CD mix.
About a year or so later, I found another CD package called DE COLECCIÓN and this one had an A&M Records logo on it. 11 tracks on this one, most of the same ones in a slightly different order, and a few different songs. "Good", I thought, "Maybe these used the correct masters." Unfortunately, again, the tracks without the cymbals were on the CD.
A couple of years ago, I finally located all three of Maria's AyM Discos albums on vinyl (thanks to eBay). It confirmed one thing -- that the original vinyl albums also had the cymbals in the audio mix. In fact, I've been meaning to do a transfer to CD of these to replace the ones I did from cassette, but some of the vinyl's splashy "S" sounds have deterred me.
In 1997, the Mercury label released yet another compilation titled HOY Y SIEMPRE. Twelve tracks, again similar material, and again the dull mixes were used.
Flash forward to today. On the way home from work this evening, and after a dinner in our upscale King Of Prussia area, I stopped at the local Tower Records store. I hadn't been there in ages, and it sure looked different. While they had a great selection of DVDs, the CD section had shrunk by a third, with many of the old racks among the missing. I guess the bigger profits are in DVDs these days (but that's a different topic that's been addressed elsewhere). I wandered by the World Music section and was surprised to see a Maria Conchita Alonso tab. (Maybe I shouldn't have been too surprised, since it was in that very store where I found virtually all of the other Maria Conchita Alonso CDs!) There was only one disc in the tabbed section, and it was yet another compilation -- titled LO MEJOR DE MARIA CONCHITA ALONSO. The back of it had an A&M Records logo (along with a Universal Special Products logo) and mentioned that it was a reissue of SP-37019. (Mentioning an old SP# alone was a treat!) The track listing looked familiar to me, and I figured it was the same tracks as one of the other CDs I already had, just with a different title and artwork. We all know that Univer$al is good for that. I was going to ignore it and walk away when I noticed that it was only $7.99. For that price, I could add it to the collection as another A&M oddity.
But, as I listened on the way home, I realized that the mixes were finally right. My compliments to Barry Korkin (I know Steve has mentioned him here) for getting this compilation right and using the correct masters. It would have been easy to just re-use the master from the EMI disc -- the track list is identical, but someone, and I can only guess that it was Mr. Korkin or perhaps Jeff Fura or Lynise Levine, also listed as compilation co-ordinators, should get credit for making this one better than the others.
Once home and online, I find that this particular disc (with a 2000 copyright date) is even cheaper through CDNow, at $6.89. You can't go wrong for that price. The link for the CDNow page is in this post (it's a big, hairy link thingy), so I put it in it's own topic to make this more readable:
http://www.amcorner.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=451
Harry
...longwinded, online...
