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This album, needs very few words of explanation. To millions it’s another superb package of mood music to add to a record collection that probably includes several, if not all, of Jackie’s previous albums.
Label: Capitol SW 1689
Cover Photo/Capitol Photo Studio/Ken Veeder
Mozart’s opera “The Marriage of Figaro” provided its composer with one of the greatest triumphs of his short lifetime; this event took place about six months after the world premiere in Vienna on the 1st May 1786, when the opera was performed for the first time in Prague.
Label: Deutsche Grammophon 136 272 SLPEM
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Johnny Keating’s Kombo -The Donkey Serenade, Ted Heath And His Music – Johnny One Note, Los Machucambos – Granada, International “Pop” All Stars – The Poor People Of Paris, Stanley Black Orchestra With Women’s Voices – Caravan, Eric Rogers And His Orchestra – Tiger Rag, Rudi Bohn And His Band – Mack The Knife, Edmundo Ros And His Orchestra – My Old Kentucky Home, Ronnie Aldrich And His Two Pianos – Unforgettable, Werner Müller And His Orchestra – You Are My Lucky Star
Label: Decca PFS 34001
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“So Much in Love!” offers a refreshing and different Conniff approach. This time, the Ray Conniff singers step out from the orchestra to sing twelve great love songs which are paired off so that each medley tells a musical story about people who are “so much in love”. For example, in the first medley, the girls sing the nostalgic “Autumn Leaves”, recalling a lost or distant love. The men answer with “Just Walking in the Rain”, as they find themselves in pretty much the same situation. The two songs are interwoven to complete the story in song. As you listen, you may even find yourself remembering romantic situations suggested by these songs… after all, hasn’t everybody, at one time or another, been “So Much in Love!”
Label: Columbia BPG 62103
When André Previn was a little boy in Berlin, where his father was a lawyer and amateur pianist, he would sit under the piano at family musicales while his father and friends played for their own amusement. “I was involved unconsciously with music as far back as I can remember. The father left Germany to get out of the way of the Nazis and took his family to California, where André was unceremoniously deposited in a public school without possessing a single word of English. He felt terribly embarrassed and awkward; it must have been a traumatic experience. Yet, to compensate for what he felt, he turned to music as a means of showing his worth.
Label: CBS SBPG 62086
Music of romance seems invariably to draw forth the most rapturous melodies composers can offer, and Percy Faith’s arrangements of the tunes in Exotic Strings are undeniably in keeping with their mood of moonlight, romance and rapture. Probably no other conductor-arranger is so successful in the presentation of romantic music, keeping the sound tastefully rich and – at the same time allowing full outpouring of the melodies.
The Faith technique is stunningly evident in the present collection. To the fifty virtuoso strings comprising his orchestra, he has added exotic rhythm instruments to enhance the sonorous depth and breadth of his arrangements. The immense Hollywood recording studio where this album was made is ideally suited for capturing the flowing components of orchestral voices and countermelodies.
The repertoire of Exotic Strings offers fine Broadway and Hollywood ballads by Alexander Borodin (by way of Robert Wright and George Forrest’s musical version of ‘Kismet’), Arthur Schwartz, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter and Vincent Youmans. And in addition to such favourites as Poinciana, Nightingale and My Shawl, Percy has included an original composition, Chico Bolero. The unusual effect of plucked strings playing in countermelody against soaring strings is one of this selection’s particular delights.
In Exotic Strings, the Faith sound is gloriously displayed. The music provides a splendid medium for orchestral enchantment, and the enchantment, in turn, enhances the music in a way that is both intimate and expansive.
Label: CBS BPG 62121
Composer-conductor-arranger Bert Kaempfert created a sensation with the million-selling hit recording of the hauntingly beautiful WONDERLAND BY NIGHT. With it, he almost single-handedly reestablished the popularity of the big band, and in so doing became one of its most popular and vital forces.
WONDERLAND has been followed by a bright succession of Kaempfert hits the most recent of which, and perhaps the most significant being AFRICAN BEAT together with the title song of this album, and THAT HAPPY FEELING. All these three titles are original Kaempfert compositions, and they represent with their brilliant trumpet passages and beautiful intrusions of massed strings one of the most rhythmically exciting and melodically imaginative sounds ever conceived by Mr. Kaempfert or anyone else on the scene today.
Mr. Kaempfert, like many other modern young men of music, has long been fascinated by the music of Africa; and in particular by the unique rhythms and “penny whistle” sound that is the result of the mergings of Europeon and African negro elements in South Africa. Thus, this album is the outcome of much research and study. Its moods range from softly sentimental to almost boisterously swinging. The sound is characteristically rich.
Label: Polydor 237 584
In this record of great film melodies you will find a selection that will recall memories of many notable films, all made within the last decade.
That’s Entertainment, a tune that has become a show Dietz business Howard zu.th classic, 1931I le Band Wagon” which starred Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse and Jack Buchanan.
Gigi was composed for the film of the same name by Allan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe. The title role was portrayed by Leslie Caron and her suitor by Louis Jourdan; Maurice Chevalier and Her-mione Gingold played supporting roles in this delightful film.
Audrey Hepburn starred as the unforgettable Holly Golightly in the film “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”. The waltz Moon River, written by Johnny Mercer and Henry Mancini received the 1961 Academy ‘Oscar’ Award as “the outstanding tune composed for a motion picture” In that year.
Like so many of the stage shows for which Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II wrote the music, “Flower Drum Song” was converted Into a film starring Nancy Kwan, James ShIgeta and Miyoshi Umeki. In the film it was Nancy Kwan who sang / Enjoy Being A Girl.
“West Side Story” was another stage show to become an equally successful film with Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, George Chakiris and Russ Tamblyn as the stars. The music, including the tune Tonight, was composed by Stephen Sondheim and Leonard Bernstein.
Label: Columbia 33 SX 1434
George Albert Shearing was born totally blind in London, England on August 13th, 1919. Studying piano by the Braille method at the Linden Lodge School for the Blind, he developed a solid classical technique and a lasting affection for Bach and Debussy.
After graduating from Linden Lodge, he toured with a band of blind musicians, discovered jazz and settled into a solo piano career.
During the War, he was featured with the Ambrose orchestra, starred on his own B.B.C. radio show and wrote arrangements for top English bands. He was voted Britain’s outstanding pianist for seven straight years in polls conducted by the Melody Maker.
He paid America a brief professional visit in 1945 and two years later moved his wife and small daughter there to stay. His unique Bach-to-bop piano stylings were soon adding to the excitement on New York’s 52nd Street.
In 1949, a quartet (composed of piano, clarinet, bass and drums) with which he had been working was approached to make records. At the last moment, it was discovered that a previous contractual agreement prevented the clarinettist from playing the record date. George quickly put together a new group, substituting vibraphone and electric guitar for the clarinet.
The group’s first recording for MGM produced September in the Rain. It and the new “Shearing Sound” were an overnight sensation. Nightclub, theatre and concert offers poured in as the George Shearing Quintet turned out hit after hit. The rest is history.
The “Shearing Sound” flows effortlessly from a mellow blend of piano, vibraphone, electric guitar, bass and drums. It floods ballads and up-tempo numbers with warmth, humour and an abiding respect for the melody. It keeps a fascinating balance between liquid-smooth ensembles and glittering solo work. It makes new material sound “lived in” and more familiar material shimmer and sparkle with surprise. Rhythmically, it never pushes – it floats. As a most functional and flexible kind of mood music, it soothes or stimulates – as unobtrusive background music or, for those who prefer to probe more as an unfailing source of absolutely first-rate collective and individual musicianship.
This collection of favourites by the quintet includes some of its most compelling performances. Sit back, relax and get to know the soft and silky “Shearing Sound”. As your ears will lose little time in telling you, familiarity breeds content.
Label: MGM C-912
