The Complete Albums 1959-62

Jonathan Winters was an American comedian, actor, broadcaster, TV presenter, artist and author who received eight Grammy nominations for Best Comedy Album during his career. He had a troubled childhood and developed his comedy persona as a response to his emotional traumas, and won a talent competition which led to a job as a DJ where his comedy gradually took over the show. He was a constant sufferer from nervous breakdowns and bi-polar disorder, which contributed to his approach as a pioneer of improvisational stand-up comedy, with a gift for impressions and mimicry, developing a range of characters that he used in his act – as he said himself: “I was fighting for the fact that you could be funny without telling jokes”. This 3-CD set comprises the complete contents of his first five albums, all on the Verve label – “The Wonderful World of Jonathan Winters”, “Down To Earth”, “Jonathan Winters In Concert: Here's Jonathan”, “Another Day, Another World” and “Humor Seen through the Eyes of Jonathan Winters”, all of them recorded in front of a ‘live’ audience. It naturally includes many of the routines which made him famous on TV. For those unfamiliar with his work, it’s a great introduction to a highly individual entertainer, and for those revisiting his work from those times, it’s a feast of comedy very much of its era, but which laid the groundwork for later performers.