From Allan Browne, awarded the prestigious Australia Council Don Banks Award for his contribution to Australian music in 2000, a personally edited retrospective of his recording career from 1960 to 2000. This period preceded a two year battle with severe emphysema and a subsequent lung transplant at Melbourne's Alfred Hospital.

Allan resumed playing in November 2002 and appeared at the Melbourne International Jazz Festival in 2003 with his colleagues of 20 years, Paul Grabowsky and Gary Costello.

Allan's 42 years in Jazz include some 70 CDs and albums, covering the century of genres from early New Orleans to Contemporary Jazz. He has accompanied over 35 International Jazz icons including Phil Woods, Milt Jackson, Johnny Griffin, Herb Ellis, Mal Waldron, Art Hodes and recently Sheilah Jordan.

This double CD carefully reflects the huge diversity of styles and the chronological development of Allan amongst his wonderful colleagues. It also reflects his obsession with Jazz as a conversation, a collective improvisation, as it was in New Orleans at the turn of last century. Of the total 21 tracks, 6 are released for the first time and 6 are released for the first time on CD. Two of the titles are from two separate CDs that won the Aria Best Jazz Album award and 5 are from separate Aria shortisted CDs.

The production features thirty eight of Australia's leading Jazz musicians, from a wide variety of disciplines. This historical 2CD set, available at a very special price, will be of enormous interest to Australian jazz collectors and recent admirers of Allan's music alike.

"Browne stands out because of two rare and inextricably linked gifts. The first is some kind of mysterious internal radar that locks into the dynamics going on around him, giving him a Zelig-like ability to not only blend in and hold it all together but to draw exuberance from the material itself. The second is his openess, no mean feat in a world as fictionalised as jazz but consistent with an art form so capacious and vibrant." ****/5 Leon Gettler, The Age.

"Through it all - old and new, exuberant and reflective - Browne's drumming skills underpin performances that dance with collaborative energy, wit and intelligence. Here is a revealing glimpse of a man who is musical to the very core of his soul." Kenny Weir, Sunday Herald Sun.

Album Tracks

1. Disc One: The Girls Go Crazy
2. Bluin' The Blues
3. Where Did You Stay Last Night
4. Jersey Lightning
5. Laundromat
6. Some Sweet Day
7. The Horse Has Bolted
8. That's A Plenty
9. Solid Old Man
10. Clarinet Marmalade
11. Panama Rag
12. Mingusee
13. East St Kilda Toodle-Oo
14. Morning Service
15. Disc Two: The Happy Go Lucky Country
16. Stars Apart
17. The Mob
18. E.S.P.
19. Birdcalls
20. Sooty's Return / Recessional