Little Girl Blue [Vinyl] [Limited Edition, Import]

Nina Simone | Format: Vinyl

Product Details

• Vinyl (January 11, 2011)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Limited Edition, Import
• Label: JAZZ WAX RECORDS
• ASIN: B002H3ETYG
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #33,335 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Mood Indigo (Mills-Ellington-Bigard) 4:01

2. Don't Smoke In Bed (Willard Robinson) 3:13

3. He Needs Me (Arthur Hamilton) 2:30

4. Little Girl Blue (Rodgers-Hart) 4:19

5. Love Me Or Leave Me (Kahn-Donaldson) 3:22

6. My Baby Just Cares For Me (Kahn-Donaldson) 3:38

7. Good Bait (Tadd Dameron-Count Basie) 5:28

8. Plain Gold Ring (Earl S. Burroughs) 3:53

9. You'll Never Walk Alone (Rodgers-Hammerstein II) 3:49

10. I Loves You Porgy (George & Ira Gershwin) 4:11

11. Central Park Blues (Nina Simone) (Instrumental) 6:51

Editorial Reviews

2009 Limited Edition Classic LP's. High Definition Premium Vinyle pressing for super fidelity. 180 gram vinyl audiophile pressing.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nina's first two releases, 1957 and 59! Plus live stuff!, February 10, 2005

By 

Campbell Roark "tri-zeta" (from under the floorboards and through the woods...) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Little Girl Blue (Audio CD)

If you're checking this out- Good! You've got taste, obviously, or you wouldn't be here. Pick Up a used copy of this little sweetheart- you won't be let down!

For me, the original record, "Jazz As Played In An Exclusive Side Street Club" (US, 1958, BETHLEHEM BCP 6028), was one of those vinyl finds that diggers hope for but RARELY ever get. After a couple hours of grimy fingered flipping through some stacks of old Gospel records in this rundown flea-market in Hinton, WV- I unearthed the title above. Old as hell and grimy, some rain damage- but still... made my week!

That record consisted of the following tracks: "Mood Indigo," "Don't Smoke In Bed," "He Needs Me," "Little Girl Blue," "Love Me Or Leave Me," "My Baby Just Cares For Me," Good Bait" (a nice long tempestuous instrumental), "Plain Gold Ring," "You'll Never Walk Alone" (another great instrumental), "I Loves You Porgy," and "Central Park Blues" (a nice pensive instrumental). The versions of I loves you Porgy was the tune that got her signed. Little Girl Blue gets her standard 'Good King Wenceslaws' treatment- that fusion blew me away the first time I heard it! He Needs Me is a sweet sad, poignant short little tune!

Soooooooo... this CD is the Import version of that first album by Nina, plus the second (which was "Nina Simone And Her Friends" (US, 1959, BETHLEHEM BCP 6041: only four tracks: "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands," "I Loves You Porgy" (reprise from the previous album), "For All We Know," and another instrumental- "African Mailman.")). The sound is cleaned up a little. No remastering but the sound was pretty good to begin with. Whoever NEON is- they added four pretty rollicking live tracks at the end to flesh this out. The live tracks are B+, A- quality. I'm not sure where they come from- what show...

I love the style of Nina's piano playing and her original takes on arrangements. That's another reason to get this- her piano playing isn't hampered/over encumbered by a loud band.... Her classical training is showcased all over this! Nina was an imaginative player and this is perhaps the best demonstration of her incredible talent as a pianist (she trained at Juilliard in the 50's to be a classical pianist, if ya didn't know), she rises to the occasion and takes the weight, deftly. This is before she had legions of backup players aiding her- Sometimes it's just a young Nina, her piano and a drum or bass. Excellent! The stripped down atmosphere really suited her!

My only beef with this is that whoever put it out (Neon?) messed with the original track listing. They mixed songs from the two releases together- not that you'd know if you'd never have heard the original. The vinyl was well put together in terms of how the tracks flowed into each other. Here: there's no real continuity, thematically or stylewise. But once you get this you can play with it to your heart's content- on your PC, IPOD or whathaveyou...

Honestly- you can't go wrong with this CD and you definitely can't go wrong with Nina, may her soul rest in peace.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Little Girl Not So Blue, March 23, 2007

By 

Gareth Davies-Morris "dodgem-dude" (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Little Girl Blue (Audio CD)

Everyone knows that Nina's first album is 5-star and then some, being one of the finest debuts ever recorded (IMHO). Piano trio with a gospel twist, it features two of her biggest hits, My Baby Just Cares For Me and I Loves You Porgy, as well as other gems like Plain Gold Ring, Mood Indigo, and the gorgeous, melancholy title track (for me, her finest moment) that so remarkably interpolates Good King Wenceslas. The Fuel remastering is crisp (if indistinguishable from the 2003 Metro reissue) and includes the long version of My Baby Just Cares For Me as a bonus track. The sequence may disappoint some, as it's not the better-known playing order that puts My Baby... at the start and Little Girl Blue at the end. Instead, Fuel went back and shifted tracks around to recreate the album's original release as Jazz Played In An Exclusive Side Street Club, with the tracks from Nina Simone and Her Friends added at the end, including her amazing rendition of He's Got The Whole World In His Hands. It's still a great listening experience, if less familiar that way. Cool artwork, too, with Joseph Muranyi's original LP liner notes, a brief new essay, and both versions of the cover art (same photo, different title and layout). These songs have been reissued in so many formats, some rather shoddy, that people have a right to wary about how they buy them now. Happily, the Fuel disc gives you the goods.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the absolute best albums of music ever recorded!, June 2, 2009

By 

R. M. Hatch "Raydance" (Windsor Mill, MD) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Little Girl Blue (Audio CD)

As a child; I used to awake to the sound of the music from this album accompanied by the drone of the vacuum cleaner as my mom began her chores on Saturday morning. My mother, who is a listener to all things musical, played this album so often (along with other artists which include Ray Charles, Etta James, Jimmy Smith, Ella Fitzgerald, Gloria Lynne, John Gary and even Chopin) that she literally played the grooves off the record! Eventually my sister had my mom's copy of the original LP (recorded on the Bethlehem label) made into a clock in my mother's honor and as an award (as it were) to recognize her appreciation of great music. I searched for years afterward trying to find the album exactly as it had been with the songs in their original playing order and finally did many years later as a re-issue on a newer version of the Bethlehem label but with more modern cover art (a slight disappointment) in the late 70's. I bought two; one for myself and one for my mom and then I was also lucky enough to run across it yet again some years later on the Salsoul label with the original album photo on the front cover still in tact. To date; I have so many copies and re-incarnations of this music that I could open up my own Nina Simone - "Little Girl Blue" music store! It was years before I knew that songs like "Mood Indigo", "Little Girl Blue", "Love Me or Leave Me" and "I Loves You, Porgy" didn't sound anywhere near as fine as Ms. Simone's renditions of these great songs. I recently had the pleasure of performing in a production of "Sophisticated Ladies" which contained a version of "Mood Indigo". My mom and sister were completely taken aback to hear the song as it was originally written by Duke Ellington; having become so predestined to Nina's treatment. Nina Simone has the most uncanny ability to mix her classical piano training w/her incomparable feel for jazz to create some of the most moving and original sounding music (I think) ever recorded on this; her debut recording. Her trio swings with wild abandon on the opening track of "Mood Indigo" and again on "Love Me or Leave Me" before Nina seamlessly transitions into swingin' classical intervals mid-song and then back into the original groove of the song w/o ever sounding jarring or overdone. It's like magic; amazing! Her soulful contralto sounds like the feel of brushed satin on ballads like "Don't Smoke in Bed", "He Needs Me" and "Plain Gold Ring". When she attacks her dramatic rendition of "He Got the Whole World in His Hands" which builds and builds to such a dramatic climax that one is not quite sure whether she's aware of just how greatly she is moving her listeners, it almost moves one to tears. Then there is her swinging original composition of "Central Park Blues" which evokes the feeling of the infamous plot of land located in center of NYC with surprising reality; expressing all the joy and the caution. Last but by no stretch of the imagination least is the lively, happy-go-lucky treatment of "My Baby Just Cares for Me" which to my delight re-surfaced a decade or so ago as the musical backdrop on a commercial for a product about which I don't even remember nor care. It bought the song and the artistry of Ms. Simone back to the forefront for many and introduced her for the very first time to many more. The song is nothing less than infectious given that Simone treatment. If you have ever considered yourself a Nina Simone fan and have by any chance not had the experience of enjoying this collection of recorded music then you should re-think your personal definition of what a fan truly is. This album is a gem from start to finish; starting with the photo of Nina sitting on a park bench somewhere in Central Park in her red checked poncho looking ever so forlorn and lonely, right down to the very last note of the very last song. The re-issued CD does include other songs recorded by Nina for the Bethlehem label not included on the original vinyl release but the additions fit right in with the jazzy, soulful feel of the musical landscape and their inclusion was a wise choice indeed. "Little Girl Blue" was not only a groundbreaking musical treasure; it's quite simply the eight wonder of the world!