What are we supposed to make of this? As with Sleepy Night’s previous volume of archive Ferguson material, this is a release as botched as it is mono-dimensional. The appalling accompanying press pack is the first offender, reeling off a list of the trumpeter’s ‘achievements’ that make his career seem like one of little more than numeric merit (‘the highest recorded note on the trumpet’, ‘most YouTube views of a jazz trumpeter’, ‘scored a Top 40 pop single’), even succeeding in getting the title of the earliest performance heard here – 1944’s ‘Memories of You’ wrong.

Those who know Ferguson’s work intimately can tell you that his was actually a far more nuanced talent than legend allows, and that his skill as a bandleader was second to none.

Sadly, this collection – drawn from a wide variety of live tapes covering virtually his entire musical lifespan, and with no personnel details provided – goes straight for the Ferguson of popular myth, the great brass athlete whose dog whistle soloing is the kind of thing that turns high note junkies on and jazz lovers off. Early showcases (presumably with Stan Kenton’s band) are pure showbiz, as indeed is that opening track, on which the teenaged trumpet tyro mixes Harry James and Roy Eldridge to rather charming effect. But by the time we get to the 1970s, what was once towering has become altogether tacky. Take ‘Over The Rainbow’, a gloopy dollop of whale soundscapes and excrescent funk rhythms.

There are some good things, of course, notably 1967’s ‘Sound of The Trumpet’ which boasts impressive saxophone solos (uncredited) by Ronnie’s Scott and Ross, their impact, however, sabotaged for being tape-transferred at the wrong speed.

And that leads to the question of production values, or rather the absence of them. Audio quality is wildly variable and one track – the horrendously amped-up ‘Maria’ - even boasts the sound of the engineer turning the tape off and on.

The final crowning moment of time-locked cringe-worthiness comes in Ferguson’s ‘joke’ about rape ahead of ‘The Conquistadors’. Quite why anyone would resuscitate that in this day and age is beyond me. Being charitable, I’m tempted to call this collection a missed opportunity but in the spirit of honesty, I’ll call it what it is – a total mess.