Customer Reviews

Blues In The Night: The Johnny Mercer Songbook

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Perfect collection for anyone who wants to get to know one of AMERICA's greatest songwriter.MERCER did everything in the music business:a singer,a co-founder of CAPITOL records in 1942,but mostly a great natured man from the friendly town of SAVANNAGH,GEORGIA.Virtually every singer from SINATRA to ROSEMARY CLOONEY has sung his songs that are easily recognizable.JOHNNY had a flair for writing lyrics to music like few people.It always seems so easy when you hear his songs .Isn't that the recipe for any writer of songs,to make them sound simple?This collection gives you a sample of MERCER's incredible production (more than a thousand tunes).

This album is a terrific set of real giants jazz musicians: Louis Armstrong with Blues in the night makes a splendid tour de force combining his grasping voice and his admirable trumpet. Billie Holiday shining as always with this theme loaded of suggested sensuality: I thought about you: Come rain or come shine with Anita Day is a very soft and charming melody. The sensational Margaret Whiting singing this swing melody: Dearly beloved. Buddy Rich with this theme that invites to dance Goody Goody a joyous piece in the great Decade of the Great Bands: 1936. Then we come to the famous piece Skylark with the incandescent voice of Ella Fitzgerald with Nelson Ridle's orchestra, one of the best selections of the CD. But if you are not convinced the session continues with Laura an everlasting melody immortalized by Errol Garner and Charlie Parker but this version of Billy Eckstine has its own charm and profile very appropriate for a romantic mood. Sarah Vaughn is the next guest with Day in-day out. Try to think in Diane Krall and please tell me if she is or not her major influence: Vaughn is simply divine in this rapture track. Woody Herman plays the classic theme Early autumn in a very warm version. Dinah Washington makes a impressive performance of I remember you ; Helen Merrill with the erotic and sensually suggestive Any place I hang my hat is home. Dee dee Bridgewater makes a very touching performance of the ultra beloved Autumn leaves: she offers the perfect balance between le chanson francaise and the purest rapture midnight jazz: that piano solo elaborates a slender cadenza that allows to link the second part of the melody. The incredible final is simply amazing and is without any shadow of doubt. But the best is yet to come when Billie Holiday sings One for my baby: that expressive voice that becomes in another instrument : she and his fellow partner: the great Ben Webster will involve you from the first bar. Bing Crosby finalizes this golden album with Jeepers Creepers.
The question is how can you live without this album? I knew about this gem CD just today and I must recommend for all the hard fan jazz and far beyond because this compilation, literally overpasses its own time.

A real treasure!