The Kraft Music Hall Starring Al Jolson

The World's Greatest Entertainer...As You've Never Heard Him Before!

In the annals of American Show Business, circa 1900-1950, you could make a convincing argument that there should really be only two names:

Al Jolson...

...and Everybody Else.

He was a towering figure of the musical theatre - unquestionably the most exciting stage star of his generation, and a profound influence on the generations to follow. He was the first breakthrough star of talking pictures -- his string of Vitaphone successes between 1927 and 1930 - "The Jazz Singer," "The Singing Fool," "Say It With Songs," and "Mammy" - helping to get a new era in filmdom off to a high-energy start. He was a recording artist of long standing: between 1912 and 1930, Al Jolson placed 85 songs on the pop music charts. Twenty-three reached No. 1, putting him ahead of the Beatles and Elvis Presley.

But for most of his career, success in radio seemed to elude Jolson.

He made several attempts as the host of variety programs during the 1930s and early 1940s, but it wasn't until Jolson's dramatic resurgence in popularity after the Second World War that he found a radio format that truly captured something of the dynamism Jolson brought to his live performances. Taking over the venerable "Kraft Music Hall" in 1947 - a series he had headlined briefly in the early 1930s - Jolson parlayed renewed interest in his career sparked by the smash motion-picture success "The Jolson Story" into one of postwar radio's brightest musical-variety attractions.

The program was a masterpiece of careful planning and careful understanding of how to package a performer to his best advantage. Previous Jolson vehicles had presented him either as a solo master-of-ceremonies or as a singing top-banana comedian, his gags propped up by an assortment of increasingly unfunny stooges. Neither role genuinely suited him. But in preparing the 1947 season of the Kraft series, the J. Walter Thompson agency staff finally came to understand that the only way to properly present Jolson on radio was to simply let Jolson be Jolson -- punching over his songs in his inimitable manner, practically leaping out of the loudspeaker to entertain his audience.

But too much Jolson could wear out any audience -- which is where Oscar Levant comes in. Laconic, sarcastic, obsessive-compulsive to the point of mania -- and a musical genius to boot -- the pianist/raconteur had built a cult following through his regular appearances on the panel quiz "Information Please" since the late 1930s, until clashes with that program's iron-fisted producer compelled his departure. Levant was about as opposite in performing style and manner from Jolson as possible -- but in a classic case of 'opposites attract,' the two immediately clicked, complementing each others' style rather than detracting from it, and creating an unlikely partnership that quickly zoomed to a lofty spot on the Hooper charts.

Recordings from this series have long been available, but in wildly variable audio condition and often chopped and cut to bits in Armed Forces Radio rebroadcast versions. But now, you can hear these classic radio programs as you've never heard them before -- even BETTER than they sounded when first broadcast! Digitally remastered from pristine NBC Orthacoustic linecheck lacquers, and painstakingly restored, these 1948-49 programs are big time late-era radio entertainment at its finest.

Experience a legend once more -- or discover him for the first time -- with this collection from Radio Archives: ten half-hour NBC network broadcasts featuring Al Jolson, Oscar Levant, Lou Bring and his Orchestra, announcer Ken Carpenter, and a sparkling array of top notch guest stars.