Customer Reviews

Chim Chim Cheree & Other Children's Choices

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Originally released on LP in 1964 about the time the movie "Mary Poppins" was released (his versions of the title track and "A Spoonful of Sugar" are on here), this CD features Burl singing mostly Disney classics and other childrens classics such as "Swinging On a Star," "Who's Afraid of The Big Bad Wolf," "Funicula, Funiculi," "Mairzy Doats," plus nice stereo remakes of his own classics "Lavender Blue," and "Polly Wolly Doodle". If you like the elementary level childrens music on the "Little White Duck" CD on Columbia that is now very rare, buy a copy of this CD at the low prices offered here on Amazon Marketplace.

This release is by Walt Disney Records, and was part of an experiment that Disney conducted in 1998. They released in a CD format a small sampling of vintage records from the vault in very limited editions to see how they would sell. This was known as the Archive Collection. During the period that Randy Thornton was rescuing the soundtrack albums of classic Disney movies, and remastering them for new releases, I believe he was allowed to pick a handful of the non-animated film LPs to get the same treatment. Hed they sold better, we would see more like these. As it was, the market for them was not big enough for Disney to re-release the whole catalog. As it was these were each in a small enough limited edition as to be numbered on the rear of the jewel case. The others 4 CD's in the group include Rex Allen Sings 16 Favorite Songs; Let's Get Together With Hayley Mills; Cliff Edward's Ukelele Ike Sings Again; Louis Prima & Gina Maione's Let's Fly With Mary Poppins.
This Burl Ives album was first released in 1964, and was produced by Disney regular Camarata. Burl Ives had a long relationship with Disney, and worked with the studio to select a few of his favorite songs for includion, including the then popular Mary Poppins. A lead sheet written by Disney's Poppins composers the Sherman Brothers was discovered with additional lyrics noot used in the film, but that Ives includes on his version of Chim Chim Chiree. The song Lavender Blue, Dilly Dilly is sung by Ives in the Walt Disney Studios first live action movie, 1948's "So Dear to My Heart" which he also appeared in. The song was nominated for an Academy Award (R).
The songs in order are:
01 Chim Chim Cheree
02 Swinging On a Star
03 Funiculi Funicula
04 Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf
05 Polly Wolly Doodle
06 Let's Go Fly a Kite
07 A Spoonful of Sugar
08 Constantinople
09 Lavender Blue, Dilly Dilly
10 Mairzy Doats
11 Got the World By the Tail
12 Ilkey Moor Bar'tat

This is a children's album by the late, great folk singer Burl Ives. Burl sings these songs very well, but most of the songs also include a children's chorus. I don't really care for children's choruses, so these brats lower the quality of the album, in my opinion. The handful of songs on the album without the kids are the best ones. The most interesting song to me is "Chim Chim Cheree", which has some lyrics that were cut from the version Dick Van Dyke sang in Mary Poppins.