In a career spanning six decades and over 30 albums, singer-pianist-songwriter Blossom Dearie (1924-2009) garnered attention from popular song's finest writers including Michel Legrand, Bob Dorough, and Johnny Mercer and musicians such as Miles Davis and Bill Evans. A self-described "songwriter's singer" and "jazz musician learning to be a jazz singer," Dearie recorded for the Verve, Capitol, and Fontana labels before striking out with her own Daffodil Records; she also made numerous guest
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up, featuring a selection of the titles hitting stores today! Elton John, Madman Across the Water: 50th Anniversary Edition (Rocket/UMe) 3CD/BD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 4LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Elton John's 1971 Madman Across the Water receives a new 50th anniversary reissue. Available in three different formats, its most expansive is a 3CD/Blu-ray collection
The fourth season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is now underway, with two episodes arriving each Friday on Amazon Prime Video for four weeks. The series created by Amy Sherman-Palladino (Gilmore Girls, Bunheads) chronicles the colorful life of Midge "Mrs." Maisel (portrayed by Emmy Award winner Rachel Brosnahan) as she carves out a career in New York in the rough-and-tumble world of stand-up comedy; the current season finds her in 1960, working at a seedy burlesque house and navigating the
Kritzerland has announced its first slate of releases for 2022. Leading off the trio is the latest volume in the label's long-running reissue series from Ben Bagley's Painted Smiles Records. Harold Arlen and Vernon Duke Revisited Vol. 2, first released in 1980 and expanded in 1991, celebrated the two composers' oeuvres with a typically eclectic Bagley cast including jazz singer Blossom Dearie; stage and screen stars Sandy Duncan, Helen Gallagher, Dolores Gray, and Tammy Grimes; and
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Elvis Presley, Back in Nashville (RCA/Legacy) 4CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2LP Colored Vinyl: Graceland Official Store Elvis: Back in Nashville boasts 82 recordings on 4 CDs (or digitally) from The King's final Nashville sessions in 1971. With country, folk, holiday and gospel songs, pop, and rock and roll, these seminal tracks represent some of the most richly diverse in
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Steely Dan, Northeast Corridor: Steely Dan Live (UMe) CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada The first Steely Dan live album since 1995's Alive in America, Northeast Corridor was recorded on the group's last tour at venues including New York's Beacon Theater, The Met Philadelphia, and others. (The band's nine-show Beacon residency in 2018 featured themed shows including performances of
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Mary Wilson, Mary Wilson: Expanded Edition (Motown/UMe) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.) Just days before her sudden passing, Mary Wilson promised that her 1979 Motown solo debut would finally see reissue. Universal Music and Wilson's estate have made good on that promise with this new digital release. Mary Wilson: Expanded Edition will include the original Mary Wilson album produced by Motown great Hal Davis; three single versions of the album's
Over the weekend, Kritzerland announced the latest two titles in its ongoing reissue campaign of Ben Bagley's Revisited series: Cole Porter Revisited and The Unpublished Cole Porter Vol. 2. The pride of Peru, Indiana, Porter (1891-1964) remains one of the Great American Songbook's most renowned exponents. He lived long enough to see his classic songs such as "I've Got You Under My Skin," "Night and Day," "I Get a Kick Out of You," "Just One of Those Things," and "Anything Goes" become
Kritzerland has just announced two new titles today! A musical version of Vladimir Nabokov's 1955 novel Lolita hardly seemed like typical fare for the Broadway stage. Yet Alan Jay Lerner - lyricist-librettist of My Fair Lady, Camelot, and Paint Your Wagon - envisioned just that. Lolita had already been adapted by Nabokov himself for director Stanley Kubrick's 1962 film starring Sue Lyon, James Mason, Shelley Winters, and a scene-stealing Peter Sellers, but the author gave his blessing to
This past weekend - April 28, to be exact - would have marked the 95th birthday of Blossom Dearie. The singer-pianist-songwriter with the recognizably wispy, coquettish voice recorded over 30 albums for labels including Verve, Capitol, and Fontana, and collaborated with talents including Johnny Mercer, Michel Legrand, and Bob Dorough. Cherry Red's El label has just celebrated Dearie's early years with a new 3-CD set, The Adorable Blossom Dearie (superseding the label's previous single-disc
Music from Season Two of the acclaimed Amazon Prime television series boasts not one but two Barbra Streisand tunes ("Just Leave Everything to Me" from the film soundtrack of 1969's Hello, Dolly! and the evergreen "Happy Days Are Here Again") plus appearances by Frank Sinatra ("How Are Ya Fixed for Love" with Keely Smith), Blossom Dearie ("Some Other Time") and Ella Fitzgerald ("Old Mother Hubbard'). Further tracks come from Dean Martin ("I'd Cry Like a Baby"), Louis Prima and the Witnesses