Essential
Cory L. Schwent | Bloomsdale, MO United States | 05/31/2002
(4 out of 5 stars)
"I was so suprised when I listened to this. I was shocked at the mucical quality of the songs. Asided from the awful graphics and minimal notes, this fills a major hole in my collection. George's music is suprisingly interesting. All most all of his big hits are included, the rest are in the Bear Family Boxed set. If you have no George CD's in your collection, this will more than fill the void. Then you can move on to other essentials."
All the essentials
Peter Durward Harris | Leicester England | 04/27/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"George's voice has a limited range but is very easy on the ear. He first achieved fame with the American top five hit, A rose and a Baby Ruth, which sold a million. George was immediately cast as a teen idol and went on tour with various rock'n'roll singers including Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent and the Everly brothers. This allowed George to earn a good living but it wasn't the kind of music that he wanted to do. In the sixties, George achieved some success on the American country charts, notably with Abilene, Break my mind and Canadian Pacific, without becoming a really big star. George spent a lot of time touring other countries including Britain and Canada, helping to increase the popularity of country music in those countries.
George was a regular visitor to Canada and came to appreciate Canadian songwriters, especially Gordon Lightfoot, frequently covering their songs. On this compilation, you will find several of George's covers of such songs. As an international singer with only limited success in his own country, George recorded many covers.
This compilation includes his biggest American hits (A rose and a Baby Ruth, Abilene, Break my mind, Canadian Pacific) together with covers of Early morning rain, Steel rail blues (both Gordon Lightfoot), I'm gonna be a country boy again (Buffy Sainte-Marie), Both sides now (Joni Mitchell), Streets of London (Ralph McTell), Everything is beautiful (Ray Stevens) and Crystal chandeliers (Charley Pride). The last named song is Charley Pride's signature song outside the USA, yet was not even released as a single in his own country. There are plenty of other good songs - a total of 22 in all.
George is less well known in his own country than he is elsewhere in the world but this compilation contains a representative selection of his music."
Explosive
Larry G. Wiseman | st. albans, wv usa | 08/01/2007
(4 out of 5 stars)
"the best collection of classic george hamilton i have found, to date!
the sound quality is excellent. i know that anyone who likes classic country music is going to love this CD. thank you for making it available.
larry w."
Track Listings (22) - Disc #1
