" ... imagine the daunting task of mining five decades of musical gold and choosing which live recordings to enshrine on the five discs in the Smithsonian Folkways box set that commemorates the festival's 50th anniversary ... Against all odds, the five producers of this crash course in the immersive Jazz Fest experience managed to pull it off ... Technical problems forced the omission of some early performances - if theywere recorded at all - by iconic artists, like the late James Booker, while licensing issues kept other tracks on ice. That still left a wealth of material, most of it previously unreleased, for Jazz Fest lovers to feast on ... Not all 50 tracks collected here are essential listening, and veteran festers might quibble about some of the work that's either included or omitted. But taken as a whole, this handsomely packaged set, full of photos and archival notes, will help devotees recapture the magic of Jazz Fest until next year rolls around".