Customer Reviews

Fascinatin' Rhythm: Capitol Sings Gershwin

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Ok. excellent!! Maybe for my fault I buy twice of this Cd. Don't matter, I gifted it for my brother.

"Fascinatin' Rhythm," the Capitol Sings collection of George Gershwin tunes, begins with Freddy Martin and his Orchestra doing a version of "Rhapsody in Blue" to which you can swing your partner around the dance floor, perfectly capturing the charm of this series. Here are your favorite songs by our greatest composers often done in different ways from what you usually expect. But changing music style or tempo, adding percussions or strings, are what make these songs so enjoyable. Dorothy Donegan's "A Foggy Day" is a particularly jazzy version, but then Margaret Whiting's "But Not For Me" is big band style while Ann Richards does a very slow and sultry cover of "I Got Rhythm" (at least at the start). Sometimes the twist is that someone like Gordon MacRae sings "Summertime," a song he would certainly never get to do on stage in "Porgy & Bess" for a couple of rather obvious reasons. Like all the albums in this series, "Fascinatin' Rhythm" combines covers by big stars like Nat King Cole, Judy Garland, Tony Bennett and Peggy Lee with lesser known artists such as Keely Smith, Jo Ann Greer, Dakota Staton and Marian McPartland (I guess I would have to put Anna Marie Alberghetti in the middle on this one). My favorite track on this album would be Judy Garland's live version of "Swanee," but "They Can't Take That Away From Me" is certainly one of Peggy Lee's best efforts. "Fascinatin' Rhythm" may be well be the most female artist dominated disc in the Capitol Sings collection, which for my money only adds to its enjoyment.