Basie Swings Bennett Sings

Tony Bennett, Count Basie | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 10, 1990)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Blue Note Records
• ASIN: B000005HFX
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #78,554 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #57 in Music > Indie Music > Broadway & Vocalists
  • #83 in Music > Indie Music > Jazz > Swing Jazz

Track Listings

1. Life Is a Song

2. With Plenty of Money and You

3. Jeepers Creepers

4. Are You Havin' Any Fun

5. Anything Goes

6. Strike up the Band

7. Chicago

8. I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face

9. Poor Little Rich Girl

10. Growing Pains

11. I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plans

12. After Supper [#]

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good album...dubious CD transfer, January 25, 2008

By 

Comic Online (Washington, DC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Basie Swings Bennett Sings (Audio CD)

Ok, so first, the music. While this isn't Bennett's, nor the Basie Band's greatest album, by any means, it's still good. It's not hard swinging, but a light swinging, somewhere between ballads and swingers, suitable to Bennett's vocal style.

But the biggest problem is the CD itself. While the album was recorded in STEREO in 1959, the CD presents all these tracks in MONO. Why? I don't know. I have a handful of these songs on other official Capitol/Blue Note/Roulette CDs, and they are not only in stereo, but the fidelity is much cleaner. (Two are available on Basie's Roulette remasters from 2002, and another is available on Wild, Cool and Swingin'). Perhaps some of the masters were not available. Regardless, it would have been preferable to even press a stereo after-market LP, instead of these inferior mono versions, which aren't even clean-sounding mono.

Anyway, this album is available on a number of 3rd party labels and bootlegs, and they sound shoddy on all of them, too. Most are in mono, but a few are in stereo if you look around. Hopefully, someday Capitol will pull out all the masters for this album, clean them up, and release a decent sounding album in stereo.

Despite my problems with this CD pressing, this IS the best sounding version of this album to get. So, if you MUST own this one, i definitely encourage you to buy this Roulette release, as it is the best sounding of whats available.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I think this is one of the very best Tony Bennett albums, May 18, 2003

By 

Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Basie Swings Bennett Sings (Audio CD)

There are three really great Tony Bennett albums, and this 1958 album originally released on Roulette Records is one of them (for the record, the other two are "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" and "Snowfall: The Tony Bennett Christmas Album"). Ironically, Count Basie did not have all that much of a hand in the album. Yes, it is his orchestra, which certainly sounds great. But Basie only plays the piano on two of the tracks, "Life Is a Song" and "Jeepers Creepers." Bennett's own pianist Ralph Sharon not only plays the piano on the other tracks but did all the charts for these songs as well. Still, these songs are very much done in the Count Basie style, as evidenced on "Strike Up the Band," "Chicago," and "With Plenty of Money and You." You would not think of Bennett as being a jazz singer per se, but he is right at home in front of the Count Basie Orchestra proving he would have been a great band singer if he had been born a decade or two earlier. My favorite track is "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face," a song from the musical "My Fair Lady," which you would have thought was written by Bennett as it is one of those perfect marriages of singer and song. He never sang any song better than this one. This 1990 CD reissue also includes a Neal Hefti ballad, "After Supper," but even with this bonus track the main complaint about this album is that it is only a half-hour long (which is certainly representative of the times).

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Even if you don't like the song, you'll like what Tony does, June 13, 2002

By 

William E. Adams (Midland, Texas USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Basie Swings Bennett Sings (Audio CD)

This is a nice album from fairly early in Tony's career, and fairly late in Count Basie's. The count himself is only a factor in a couple of selections, although his orchestra is present throughout...but don't buy this one for Basie, buy it for Bennett. There are two numbers on here I have never liked much: "Chicago" and "Jeepers Creepers." However, I must say that I do like what Tony Bennett does with both of them. He is also super with "Anything Goes" and "I Guess I'll Have to Change my Plans." I can't fault his version of "I've Grown Accustomed to her Face" except to say that as a fan of "My Fair Lady" from the late 50's to the present, I prefer Rex Harrison's talk/sing rendition to any other style. Some of the less well-known songs on here are also quite interesting. I gave it four stars instead of five simply because it is short by modern CD standards...but it is a consistently pleasant and strong half-hour of jazz vocals.