Search - Patti Page :: Lou Stein's Music

A little unusual for Patti Page, but still nice

Bruce R. Gilson | Wheaton, MD United States | 12/22/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Three female singers who all peaked in popular esteem in the 1950s are big favorites of mine. They are Doris Day, Patti Page, and Rosemary Clooney. Since Patti Page is among those top 3, I looked forward to listening to this CD. I was somewhat surprised, but not disappointed.



This collection, recorded in 1949 (a year before some of her biggest hits) obviously features a Patti Page that doesn't sound very different from those 1950 hits, though, without the overdubbing she became famous for, there are certainly differences. The biggest surprise in the sound of this CD, though, has little to do with the overdubbing. Patti Page is known for straight pop music and somewhat country-flavored pop. But on this CD the pop is more jazz-flavored and even includes a blues-type piece ("Oklahoma Blues," according to the liner notes written specifically for Patti by Jack Rael, her manager). While I'm not big on either jazz or blues, the great Patti Page voice made the songs pleasant to listen to for me.



Many of the songs are standards, well-performed. One of the songs, "All I Do Is Dream of You," happens to be as well on another CD I review today, but Patti's version is so different from Patience & Prudence's that they hardly seem the same song! But I like each in its own way.



Unlike the other two of my top 3 favorite singers, it's hard to get anything by Patti Page on CD but her biggest hits. So I really was glad to get this CD. It's certainly a different take on Patti Page, but worth listening to and just as enjoyable as hber other material."

An eye-opener

Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 01/18/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I was recently drawn to reconsidering "Miss Patti Page, the Singing Rage," who struck gold on record after record throughout the fifties, practically all of the tunes either lightweight fluff like "Doggie in the Window," transparent sentiment like "Allegheny Mood" and "Old Cape Cod," or country and western heart-breakers like "Tennessee Waltz." Were you to drop her name in a conversation about great jazz singers, chances are you'd instantly lose credibility with any jazz listener within hearing distance. But her appearance in Chuck Stewart's collection of photographs of jazz giants for the 2010 Classic Jazz Calendar had me scratching my head until I was able to track down some revelatory recordings by Patti--performances that, at the very least, place her in the same company as many of the great singers with roots in the big band and swing era--Peggy Lee, Dinah Shore, Rosemary Clooney, Doris Day, Kaye Starr, Margaret Whiting, Jo Stafford being some of the examples that come to mind.



Her most explicit jazz recording is one she made with Pete Rugolo and a host of jazz all-stars, but this earlier recording, apparently comprising radio performances by Patti accompanied by nothing more than a piano trio is no less impressive. Coming early in her career, I'm not sure I'd have recognized her voice--it's less mannered, less calculated, just plain more "soulful" than her careful fashioning of later pop hits that are at once polished and perfect but also undeniably slick and devoid of risk or genuine feeling (more of a comment on the material than the singing).



This album reveals a youthful-sounding Patti Page who is nevertheless precociously mature, confident, expressive, and in command of material far more challenging--in terms of phrasing, expressive lyrics, and stylistic range--than her better-known recordings of the fifties. She introduces "Do Nothing Till You Hear From Me" with a gracious nod to "the great Duke Ellington" before submitting a performance of the tune perhaps second to none. She makes "Let Me Call You Sweetheart" sound as hip and swinging as Sinatra does the same for "Old MacDonald." If Billie Holiday's influence is apparent on some of the earlier tunes, when she comes to "Oklahoma Blues" she's as much "in the idiom" as a blues-belter like Mildred Bailey (Lady Day, despite "Fine and Mellow" and a couple of others, rarely sang the 12-bar blues). With "Don't Blame Me" and "I'll Never Smile Again" she summons up some of the same emotions as Sinatra, whose sense of swing she exhibits on a favorite of Old Blue's during this time, "It All Depends on You." The last tune, "Goody Goodbye" (not "Goody Goody") is unfamiliar to me, but Patti makes it work with a sense of relish and abandon that communicates verve, fun, and foot-tapping joy.



It's interesting to imagine Patti singing some of this material in the '50s. I can hear it with my mind's ear--pitch-perfect, meticulously worked out down to the minute details, nothing left to chance--but somehow less fresh, spontaneous and engaging. It's not just a little disconcerting to admit that Patti Page, despite the enormous talent on display here, owes her singular success to giving the people what they apparently wanted in the '50s, followed by a similar revolution among the public favoring the Beatles, Stones, Tom Jones and Engelbert in the '60s.



Reflecting upon the music of Louis, Bing, Fred Astaire, Glenn and Tommy, Frank and Patti in the 20s, 30s, and 40s can easily produce sufficient evidence to call claims of "progress" in the arts--whether "high culture" or simply "popular culture"--into serious question. Clearly things have changed since the invention of the microphone and of recording, but technology remains a big neutral. It can project to an expanding audience a sonic image of a harmonious community capable of recognizing and nourishing that which is most human, deeply felt, innocent, creative and imaginative or it can produce the equivalent of a gigantic WMD that ultimately proves as life-affirming as an earth-sized Quaalude."

Patti page's jazz flavored pieces

Kz | 05/20/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"[...]I am pleased to find your comment on Amazon.com for Patti Page's "The Uncollected Patti Page (1949): Patti Page With Lou Stein's Music".



I like her "jazz-flavored" and "blues-type" works early 50's or before.

But, in these days I regrettably know that her works are mostly considered in her home country as pop and novelty music except "Tennessee Waltz".



I have thought that the US Americans forgot her great voices yet. Less noteworthy than what she deserves to.



And today, I have found your review to make me happy to share my opinion with someone else, which might be rarely understood and approved.



I hope you may say loudly in your country about valuable achievement of her masterpieces 50 years or so ago.



I expect your country may honor her with enrolling in the Jazz Hall of Fame. Because I think she is the last person who knows the Jazz Age in your country, and even Billy Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, or Sarah Vaughn through her eyes and ears as a career singer, she sholud have deserved to it. Don't you think so? Or, is she a country-flavored pop singer after all?



I now enjoy collecting her early LPs.

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