The album was recorded in several sessions between the years 1947 and 1952, in sessions produced by Norman Granz. The album's lead track, "Jubilee Jump" was recorded in New York City on August 25, 1947 in a session for Apollo Records. Four songs were recorded by Barnet for this date, three of which originally appeared as 78rpm singes. Only this one track from the session makes it onto this album. It was originally released as Apollo 1092. Although recorded for Apollo, the rights for this and all subsequent Barnet sessions done for Apollo were retained by Granz, allowing its appearance here. Before appearing on this LP, it also was released as a single on Granz's Clef Records as catalog #8982. "Charleston Alley" is from November 30, 1947. This recording made its debut on Clef single #8981. From the same session come "Gal from Joe's" and "Southern Fried" The standard "Deep Purple" again originally appeared on Apollo, from a September 2, 1947 5-song session where three of the tracks were for Apollo, and the remaining 2 were for the V-Disc program. "Blue Lou" is the earliest recording on the album. It is from the earliest session that appears on this album, taking place on February 3, 1947. This session consisted of four songs, each of which appeared on Apollo as 78rpm singles. "Charleston Alley" was recorded "Blue Lou" was originally released as Apollo 1082. Rounding out side 1 were Barnet's two biggest his: Cherokee and Skyliner. These two songs were recorded March 5, 1951 in Los Angeles. They originally appeared on Clef 8981 and 8979, respectively. All of these songs appearing on side 1 were first issued on Clef LP MCG114. Side 2 consists of tracks recorded on July 9and 10. All of these were originally issued in the Clef 89000 single series, except for "St. Louis Blues" which is original to this album and has not otherwise been issued.
Reception
Although most of these tracks have not been officially issued in digital format, Scott Yanow has stated the album is "excellent" and therefore "worth searching for."
