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And her tears flowed like wine ANITA O’DAY ASV MONO Living Era AJA 5369 Crotchet midprice

 

1. Alreet
2. Georgia On My Mind
3. Just a Little Bit South of North Carolina
4. Let Me Off Uptown
5. Kick It!
6. Skylark
7. Bolero at the Savoy
8. Thanks for the Boogie Ride
9. That’s What You Think
10. Ain’t Misbehavin’
11. I Can’t Give Anything but Love
12. Build It Up, Paint It Nice and Tear It Down
13. I Lost My Sugar in Salt Lake City
14. And her Tears Flowed Like Wine
15. Gotta Be Getting’
16. Are You Livin’, Old man?
17. Travellin’Man
18. Opus One
19. Boogie Blues
20. Tea For Two
21. What is This Thing Called Love?
22. Hi Ho Trailus Boot Whip
23. How High the Moon
24. Blues for Bojangles
25. Tennessee Waltz
26. You Took Advantage of Me

1 to 9 Gene Krupa and his Orchestra (1941)
10&11 Nat Cole Trio (1944)
12 to 17 Stan Kenton and his Orchestra (1944/5)
18 to 20 Gene Krupa and his Orchestra (1945)
21&22 Will Bradley and His Orchestra (1947)
23 Ralph Burns and his Orchestra (1947)
24 Paul Jordan and his Sextet (1950)
25 Ben Homer and his Orchestra (1950)
26 Jack Pleis and his Orchestra (1950)

The Big Bands of the 1940 to 1950 period had to cope with two missions at the same time, one to play music which satisfied the musician’s, the vocalists and the bandleader and secondly to produce the ‘pop’ records of the day for an audience with little musical discernment. This record has examples of both, from the boring Tennessee Waltz to the super-swinging Opus One. The bands of course had to make a living and sentimental tunes and novelty numbers, were a sure-fire winner in the pop scene of the day. The good news is that Anita O’Day shines through it all like the professional jazz singer that she is and the swinging outweighs the dull.

Anita O’Day was born in 1919 and she has been swinging and singing from young adult to today. She joined the Gene Krupa band as featured singer in 1941 and stayed to 1943, she enjoyed a major hit with Let Me Off Uptown which is part of this collection. She had another hit after joining the Stan Kenton Band with And her tears flowed like wine. At the time she was famous and no one had heard of the Kenton Band, so she helped to bring the Kenton Band to the notice of the public. She returned to the Krupa band in 1945 before leaving in 1946 to pursue a solo career which has continued ever since. Her 1958 appearance in the Newport Jazz Festival, which is preserved for posterity in the film Jazz on a Summer’s Day, brought her back to the attention of the public. I had the good fortune to see her in New York in 1987 and she was certainly still in good voice at that time. She has all the attributes of a great jazz singer intonation, diction, timing and the ability to improvise and scat with the best. She is without doubt a premier league jazz singer.

Overall this is a very enjoyable album despite the items intended for the pop charts.

Don Mather

 

 

 
 
 
 

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