In this tribute to Jim Reeves, Big Burley sings some of the biggest hits to ever come out of the country music capital of the world—Nashville, Tennessee. Jim was loved by country music fans the world over. We miss Jim today, but his unimitable (sic) style goes on.
Another belter from the Stereo Gold Award stable (aka D.L. Miller money-making racket). Budgets so low they recycled the cover photo for another release along the same lines. The next time as “Country Hits Volume 1” as seen here.
Kai Warner In A Persian Market Franz Loeffler Moon River Kurt Edelhagen Exodus – Main Theme Kurt Wege Sleigh Ride Henry Loges Greensleeves Erwin Halletz La Cucaracha Bert Kaempfert Strangers in the Night Max Greger Il Silencio Heinz Schachtner A Song Of Joy Erwin Halletz Tico Tico Fred Forster Londonderry Air Arthur Fiedler Night And Day
No secret: humans have two ears. It registers the sound according to direction and distance – it hears in stereo, that is, spatially. The stereophony (for example on this long-playing record) adjusts to it. It does not preserve the sound as point information – it captures two different acoustic pieces of information and transmits them via two sound channels. The playback result is perceived as spatial by the listener. Stereo is not a “ping-pong effect”; not only right-left impulses are conveyed. Stereophony makes sounds transparent, it represents their constant movement – not only lateral deflections, but also foreground and background. The sound image appears through – Clear, clear-cut, structured. Individual groups of instruments retain their isolation in the overall tonal picture. Stereophony counteracts the human auditory functions. It adjusts to the simple and inevitable fact that human beings have two ears.
Features: Garry Blake and His Music, Manuel and the Music of the Mountains, Hank Marvin, Ron Goodwin and His Orchestra
Meet John MacLeod’s String Bag of Bones, an odd title for a new musical idea but one that makes sense when John explains : “It’s basically strings and trombones with one solo instrument, which can be virtually anything. On this album we’ve used nine strings, four cello and four trombones with the idea being that the strings carry the pop rhythm and the combination of strings and trombones creates what we think is a funky sort of sound and something that is a bit different and individual.”
But then searching for that extra something in music that IS different has long been a part of John MacLeod’s life. As a top composer, arranger and record producer he’s been associated with many name artists on a variety of musical levels. He’s written and produced pop hits for artists like Pickettywitch, The Foundations and John Baldry ; has created a best-selling album line with the London Pops Orchestra and now, embarking on the String Bag of Bones concept he wants “Really just to establish a style and a brand of music that everyone can recognise and enjoy. I’d like to think that when future String Bag of Bones albums are released they’re immediately recognisable.”
On this first album with String Bag of Bones, John has concentrated on good tunes and has used as his arranger Cy Paine — “Someone who I have a very high regard for and who is, I think, one of the most underrated arrangers of today. We both of us hope that this first LP will be the beginning of a successful series.”
But one doesn’t have to take John MacLeod’s word for it ; listening to an album that is indeed different and musically exciting should convince anyone that he’s succeeded in creating a successful and durable musical formula.
Every year, more and more people are visiting Greece, Cyprus and the associated Greek Islands – and there is no doubt that here they become enchanted with a unique type of music and song that is fast becoming popular all over the world.
The popularity of the modern Greek song and music is due in no small way to the exciting strains of the bouzouki – the Greek national instrument – which, together with harmonised vocals, is exploited to the full on this latest album by The Marcians.
All of the tracks on this record are new and it is probably correct to say that they comprise the major part of the current “Greek Top Twenty” – many visitors to Greece this year will return humming these melodic tunes. If you are unable to take a holiday in that part of the world – add this record to your collection and savour to the full the atmosphere of the Taverna and of a Greek holiday – expertly depicted by The Marcians.
The group comprises, as usual: Andreas Michael (bouzouki/voval), Theodosis Hambi (bouzouki/bass, guitar/vocal), Tanis Chrysostomou (guitar/vocal), Achilleas I Antoniou (percussion), and Freddie Folkes (piano/organ) and their many previous album releases include Hallmark SHM 709, SHM 653 and CHM 678 – without doubt this latest release is another “must”.
Chris Hollis.
Frankie Laine – I Believe, Anita Bryant – It Is No Secret, Johnny Cash – These Hands, Doris Day – If I Can Help Somebody, Jim Nabors – Ave Maria, Ray Conniff & The Singers – Climb Ev’ry Mountain, Andy Williams – He, Patti Page – Abide With Me, Mahalia Jackson – He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands, Roy Hamilton – You’ll Never Walk Alone
A Latin scholar will tell you that the word “Credo” means “I believe.” A student of religious music will tell you further that the Credo is the third part of the Ordinary of the Catholic Mass, and that historically it was the last of the five chants of the Ordinary to be introduced into the Mass, something that happened around 1000 A.D. Measured in terms of human life, that is a long time ago, but the union of music and religious belief goes back much, much further than that.
Music and faith are a pair, one of the oldest pairs in the history of mankind. To understand this we must realise that for the earliest men music was not an art or an aesthetic thing, but a magical force. It was something a man learned to produce in order to satisfy a desire for expression that could be satisfied in no other way. And, conversely, he found that both the singing of music and the hearing of music affected his feelings, his actions and his life in strange and powerful ways. Some men believed that man and the world were created through song, and it was a natural result that the Creator was to be worshipped in song. A history of early sacred music, then, if it were possible that such a history could be written, would be a history of all early music. God had the tunes first; the Devil only borrowed them afterward.
In Western religious music – and here we are speaking about only the last thirteen-hundred years or so – there were two great watersheds, one Catholic, the other Protest-ant. The first is what is called Gregorian chant, a body of religious tunes that accumulated gradually and was codified in its definitive form in the seventh century. It takes its name from St. Gregory, who is thought to be responsible for its bringing together. Gregorian chant is purely melodic music. completely devoid of harmony. It is still sung in Catholic churches around the world, but it has an importance beyond that in that it was the source material for the multi-voiced religious music of the Renaissance and, ultimately, for much if not most of all Western music.
The second great watershed of religious music was the Protestant or Lutheran chorale. Produced during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, based sometimes on folksongs or chants, the chorales had a square-cut rhythmic character and strongly implied harmony. In this they were quite different from Gregorian chants and what came from them was a different sort of music from Renaissance masses and motets. They instead led to the cantatas and oratorios of J. S. Bach and other composers of the northern Baroque.
All later religious music, and that includes works by Beethoven, Schubert, Bruckner, Sir Arthur Sullivan, Richard Rodgers, and contemporary religious folk singers, is based, at least in part, on one or both of those sources. And while one cannot say that I Believe is founded on such and such a chant, or that Climb Ev’ry Mountain comes from the same chorale that Bach used in a cantata, it is good to remember that they are still a part of the same tradition. For the need and the faith that produced song centuries ago was no datable thing. The same need and the same faith exist today. The style of the music may change but the idea of it is timeless and everlasting.
In the spring of 1870, when Verdi received through the post from the French librettist Camille Du Locle the synopsis of an opera plot that was to become Aida, he was in his 57th year. The days when he produced an opera every few months were far behind. The pressures, financial and psychological, had eased, and for some time past he had written operas at intervals of three of four years: Un Ballo in Maschera was produced in 1859, La Forza del Destino in 1862, Don Carlo in 1867. Between compo-sitions Verdi was happy to return to the life of a farmer at Sant’Agata.
Managements continued to request new operas from him, and librettists to suggest subjects. He could afford to wait. Du Locle, joint librettist with Joseph Mery of Don Carlo, was anxious to collaborate again with Verdi and had put forward various ideas, including Froufrou by Meilhac and Halevy, Moliere’s Tartuffe and a play by the contemporary Spanish dramatist Lopez de Ayala. When he sent Verdi the Spanish play he enclosed a four-page synopsis of an Egyptian subject. It was this that aroused the composer’s interest. Rejecting the Spanish play, he praised the Egyptian synopsis and asked who had written it.
It was a question that has not yet received a complete answer. Du Locle’s immediate reply was that he himself had put it together from a story by the French Egyptologist, Auguste Mariette. Mariette, given the ennobling title of Bey by the Khedive of Egypt in recognition of his achievements, had presented his story to the Khedive with the suggestion that it could form the basis of a really splendid opera to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal. The Khedive agreed, and through Mariette, Du Locle had been entrusted with the task of commissioning a famous composer to write the music.Verdi was the Khedive’s first choice, followed by Gounod and then Wagner.
When Verdi agreed to write the opera that became Aida, the Suez Canal had been open for several months. It might have been possible for the opera to have been written in time to inaugurate the new Cairo Opera House in November 1869, two weeks before the opening of the Canal, had Du Locle been less mysterious in an earlier approach to Verdi, when he had asked the composer if he would be willing to write an opera for a far-distant country. At that time Verdi had refused, and the Cairo Opera opened with Rigoletto. Now that he had agreed to set Mariette’s subject, a date for production was decided upon that gave him only six months to complete the opera. Du Locle drafted a complete libretto in French, but Verdi had decided the opera should be in Italian. Antonio Ghislanzoni, who some months earlier had worked on the revised Forza del Destino, was hired to translate the text into Italian verse.
Whoever may have had a hand in the libretto, the music emerged from Verdi alone – and in no more than four months. However, due to the Franco-Prussian war the shipping of the scenery from Paris to Cairo was delayed, and it was not until December 24, 1871, that Aida was given its first performance at the Cairo Opera House.
The opera was a triumph at its premiere and has remained immensely and deservedly popular ever since, though it has perhaps been somewhat misunderstood. It is generally thought of as a spectacular work, but despite the spectacle of its triumphal scene (Act II, Scene 2), which is admittedly the grandest scene in the whole of grand opera, Aida is intrinsically an intimate opera. It is an opera about individuals and their passions, not about nations and their military exploits. It also has a strong claim to be called Verdi’s most original work for the stage, combining as it does the vigor and melodic fecundity of the composer’s earlier period with something of the psychological penetration of the two masterpieces that were to follow – Otello and Falstaff – without in any way sounding like a transitional work.
It is little wonder that, in her centenary year, Aida should be at the height of her popularity with critics and public alike.
Charles Osborne
(from notes for the complete opere recording)
Label: RCA Red Seal RL 42090 Cover photo: Anthony Crickmay
Moonlighting, I’m On Fire, Hold Me Close, Fattie Bum Bum, There Goes My First Love, I Only Have Eyes For You, S.O.S., Una Paloma Blanca, Sailing, Heartbeat, L-L-Lucy, What A Difference A Day Made, Julie Ann, Chick-A-Boom (Don’t Ya Jes Love It), Feelings, Indian Love Call
Label: Contour 2870 431 Photograph: Robert Cundy Associates Design: Jack Levy
Featuring big star names including Andy Williams, Johnny Cash, Doris Day, Ray Conniff and Patti Page.
Sleeve Notes:
A Latin scholar will tell you that the word “Credo” means “I believe.” A student of religious music will tell you further that the Credo is the third part of the Ordinary of the Catholic Mass, and that historically it was the last of the five chants of.the Ordinary to be introduced into the Mass, something that happened around 1000 A.D. Measured in terms of human life, that is a long time ago, but the union of music and religious belief goes back much, much further than that.
Music and faith are a pair, one of the oldest pairs in the history of mankind. To understand this we must realise that for the earliest men music was not an art or an aesthetic thing, but a magical force. It was something a man learned to produce in order to satisfy a desire for expression that could be satisfied in no other way. And, conversely, he found that both the singing of music and the hearing of music affected his feelings, his actions and his life in strange and powerful ways. Some men believed that man and the world were created through song, and it was a natural result that the Creator was to be worshipped in song. A history of early sacred music, then, if it were possible that such a history could be written, would be a history of all early music. God had the tunes first; the Devil only borrowed them afterward.
In Western religious music—and here we are speaking about only the last thirteen-hundred years or so—there were two great watersheds, one Catholic, the other Protestant. The first is what is called Gregorian chant, a body of religious tunes that accumulated gradually and was codified in its definitive form in the seventh century. It takes its name from St. Gregory, who is thought to be responsible for its bringing together. Gregorian chant is purely melodic music. completely devoid of harmony. It is still sung in Catholic churches around the world, but it has an importance beyond that in that it was the source material for the multi-voiced religious music of the Renaissance and, ultimately, for much if not most of all Western music.
The second great watershed of religious music was the Protestant or Lutheran chorale. Produced during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, based sometimes on folksongs or chants, the chorales had a square-cut rhythmic character and strongly implied harmony. In this they were quite different from Gregorian chants and what came from them was a different sort of music from Renaissance masses and motets. They instead led to the cantatas and oratorios of J. S. Bach and other composers of the northern Baroque.
All later religious music, and that includes works by Beethoven, Schubert, Bruckner, Sir Arthur Sullivan, Richard Rodgers, and contemporary religious folk singers, is based, at least in part, on one or both of those sources. And while one cannot say that I Believe is founded on such and such a chant, or that Climb Ev’ry Mountain comes from the same chorale that Bach used in a cantata, it is good to remember that they are still a part of the same tradition. For the need and the faith that produced song centuries ago was no datable thing. The same need and the same faith exist today. The style of the music may change but the idea of it is timeless and everlasting.
Having decided to record an album of Andy Williams’ songs, in our series of tributes to great recording artistes, we were faced with a problem. Not, as is usually the case, deciding which songs to include, but how, with only one L.P. at our disposal, to whittle down to twelve the many tunes that have been made permanent favourites by his performances. Well, we’ve done our best to give a cross section of hits on this offering and can only hope that we have included your particular favourite.
Of one thing we are certain: the performance given here by the Alan Caddy Orchestra and Singers is, both in style and quality, a sincere tribute to the man who first made these songs popular.
