Customer Reviews

Dream Dancing

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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For any music lover who appreciates the incredible talents of Ella Fitzgerald, Cole Porter and Nelson Riddle, this recording will definitely put a smile on your face and will give you some of the most magnificent moments in your listening journey.

"Dream Dancing: Ella Fitzgerald & Cole Porter" is a loving tribute to the composer's 10th death anniversary. The entire album promises an enjoyable listening experience with Ella's superb interpretations of Nelson Riddle's elegant chart arrangements. The repertoire is not entirely the best and most-loved Cole Porter classics considering that more than half of the tracks are lesser-known songs, but with Riddle's beautiful orchestrations, this album becomes special and notable amongst Ella's impressive body of work.

Playing here with Nelson Riddle Orchestra are some of the finest studio musicians that include Riddle's son, Christopher Riddle on bass trombone, Ralph Basso on guitar, John Heard on bass and one of the greatest drummers the music world has ever known, Louie Bellson, among many others.

My choicest cuts include Porter's classic gems, "I Concentrate On You," "I've Got You Under My Skin," "I've Got A Kick Out of You," "Just One of Those Things," "At Long Last Love," "My Heart Belongs To Daddy" and "C'est Magnifique," one of his wittiest songs.

"When love comes in and takes you for a spin
Oh la la la, c'est magnifique
But when one day your loved one drifts away
Ooh la la la, it is so tragique
But when once more he whispers..."je t'adore"
C'est magnifique"

The second chorus of "Dream dancing" moves me to tears.
Ella at her best.

If you read ELLA's biography written by STUART NICHOLSON,you know that NELSON RIDDLE was the first choice of NORMAN GRANZ to arrange material for the songbooks.But in 1956,RIDDLE was a very busy man,working with SINATRA,PEGGY LEE and DEAN MARTIN on lps that are now considered classics.ELLA's first time at bat with NELSON was the mamooth GERSHWIN songbook of 1959.After that, they worked many times together.This 1972 album with several tracks recorded in 1978 is certainly of interest to any FITZGERALD fan,even if SO NEAR AND YET SO FAR,AFTER YOU and WITHOUT LOVE are not among PORTER's greatest songs.I CONCENTRATE ON YOU is in bossa-nova,and if you ever heard DOWN IN THE DEPTH in it's original rendition,you'll rave over this one.It may not surpass the 1956 recordings that kicked off the songbook series,but it's a nice compagnon.

This fascinating album was released in 1972 under the title ELLA LOVES COLE. Dream Dancing and After You were recorded years later, in 1978, when it became available with this form. The record is delicious, much less informal than her Porter's songbook and Ella appears happy, free, modern and mainly more relaxed than usual. It was arranged and conducted by Nelson Riddle and also counted with names as Jackie Davis (organ), Louie Bellson (drums), Paul Smith (piano) and John Heard (bass), having been produced by Norman Granz. It remits us to times, the Disco Era, when it was difficult commercially to record standards and singers must be extremely creative and inspired and daring to make such classic records like this. Despite her health problems already present, Ella sounds fresh and renew and the six years between the new songs and the others did not take the quality from Ella's immortal sound. And remember: DREAM DANCING is one of the most beautiful songs that ELLA has ever recorded, and she did it extremely well. Let the good times roll and just click. It's a MUST!

I love this album. I have it on a very well-worn and often played LP. Being able to hear the MP3s is better than nothing at all, but I sure wish someone would issue this on CD.

The interpretation of the songs and the instrumentation are superior to the Cole Porter Songbook. This is Ella with masterful phrasing, depth and maturity. Nelson Riddle's instrumentation is also very strong. This is one album I will never grow tired of.

In spite of sometimes intrusive orchestration, Ella provides virtually the best interpretation ever of every song on the album. Even her rendition of "I've Got You Under My Skin" rivals Sinatra's in terms of her ability to ride the rhythms. At 60, her voice has a richness to it that it lacked on the Cole Porter Songbook done on Verve. Note especially the not so well know title song and "After You". These lesser sung songs are gems in Ella's remarkable grasp.

This album is enjoyable forever. This album is more energetic and enjoyable than her Cole Porter songbook. I've listened to this album since the early '80s and have never tired of it.