chanteuse extraordinaire
While the first cd is technically poor (much noise and static), the chanteuse is riveting. Maybe you can pretend that you are listening to her on a radio of that time. The second disk is technically much better with a few exceptions, and of course the chantuese... I am writing this before I have listened to the third disk.

Little Sparrow still rendering us helpless with her voice
Well...rendering me helpless ,at least.
I am listening to this 3-CD set as I type this,and I am marveling at the depth of emotion in her voice.She was a little waif of a woman,but her voice could have guided ships through the fog.Unbelievably powerful,fraught with emotion in every note.
I am trying to learn French,and immersing myself in her music has helped.
Of all of her torch songs,my favorite is "Adieu,Mon Couer." Without understanding most of the words,(until I translated them)I still feel the emotion she is feeling.
She was and will always be a treasure.
May I suggest that you buy/rent "La Vie en Rose," the movie made about Piaf last year? It will kill you,but in a good way.

all my favourites
this is a compilation of all my favourite Piaf songs, many of which I only had on old tapes, so I now have them on one CD. Marvellous as I have always thought of her, and I now listen uninterrupted as I drive along motorways, singing along desperately out of tune, but imagining myself in a Left Bank cafe.

Edith Piaf: 75 Chansons
Disks 1 and 2, the older songs, are mediocre; disk # 3 is musically and technically superb.

Last 3/4 of 100 Chansons
The songs in this 3-disc collection called "75 Chansons" appear to be the same songs as those on the last 3 out of 4 discs in another collection called "100 Chansons." When "75 Chansons" discs are copied to computer for personal enjoyment, album art for "100 Chansons" appears, and the discs are labeled 2 thru 4 (instead of 1 thru 3). Both collections apparently arrange songs chronologically. The "75 Chansons" set, therefore, seems to represent later works of the artist.