Customer Reviews

Studio Recordings 1951-1953 [ORIGINAL RECORDINGS REMASTERED] 2CD SET

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Here are all the Capitol recordings Billy May made with his big band before he gave it up and returned to arranging full time. Billy would release more adventurous records in later years, but this is where his famed "slurping saxes" sound began. Beautifully assembled and a swinging joy to behold. Billy May will always be one of my favorite musicians.

If you like Sinatra's early swing albums on Capital Records like Come Fly With Me and Songs For Swinging Lovers, then you will enjoy this album by one of Sinatra's best know swing arrangers. It's like Sinatra karaoke, with all the sound of a Sinatra record minus the Sinatra attitude and voice. I highly recommend this CD!

For a mono CD this is a great clear and clean re-master. The compilation of the various songs is wonderful, some that I have never heard of before. Of course Billy May is one of my favorite bands of the early 50's as those were my teenage years. Great band and a great recording studio.

I'm afraid I'm going to have to agree 100% with Joost Kiefter on this. Billy May's signature "slurping sax" sound was done TO DEATH on his recordings. I much prefer the albums he did to back singers, because he didn't rely on one gimmick continually. Billy May was a wonderful arranger, but he fell into a trap of his own devising.

These are a 2 CDs with 50 songs on it! One song better than the other! I grew up with a big bands. This is one of the best! Put it in to your CD player and enjoy it!
GO FOR THIS ONE !

This CD is one of the best of all Billy's collection; his orchestra is simply wonderful to listen and dance.

Billy May has been one of the biggest names in the music industry ever since his first hit arrangement of Ray Noble's tune Cherokee for Charlie Barnet way back in 1939. His career was certainly on the up when Glenn Miller lured him away from Barnet. As Miller's band had a fixed musical style, Billy could no longer do as he pleased. Under Miller's scrutinous eyes he certainly learnt what the word discipline meant and he came to hate Glenn's pruning editorial scissors, but nevertheless reaped the rewards of the invaluable lessons he learnt in his two year stint with Glenn.
The funny thing is that while Billy obviously disliked the fact that Miller's strict musical policy inhibited his freedom as an arranger, on this compilation we hear a musical style that is almost religiously adhered to: the slurping saxes. And while this gimmick may be fun to listen to for the first four numbers, it becomes boring for the next five and downright annoying for the remainder of one disc and the second disc.
Now when you're on a sentimental journey back to the days of wine and roses I can imagine that you are deaf to these considerations, but without the benefit (?) of nostalgia I found the amount of tedium evoked by these recordings much worse than Glenn Miller's clarinet led reed sound. In the end I found that I regretted having bought the set at all.
Fortunately there are many other cd's on which we can hear a more musical and mature May (either as arranger for other bands or vocalists or under his own name) than the Fat Man we meet on this compilation.