Search - Peggy Lee :: Man I Love / If You Go

Outstanding songs by the immortal Peggy Lee

Matthew G. Sherwin | last seen screaming at Amazon customer service | 01/06/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Peggy Lee was one of the greatest female vocalists of the twentieth century. This two-fer CD gives us all the tracks from two of her record albums entitled The Man I Love and If You Go. Excellent!



"The Man I Love" opens the album with Peggy singing sweetly and her excellent diction bolsters her performance. Peggy sings this with so much emotion and tenderness it truly is one of the best interpretations of this ballad I've ever heard. "Happiness Is A Thing Called Joe" is a terrific Harold Arlen number that features Peggy singing so sweetly; she swings ever so gently to make this number memorable. Love that horn arrangement in the background! Moreover, listen for "Something Wonderful" from The King And I; Peggy makes this all her own as she sings this with several subtle tempo changes. Peggy Lee does it beautifully!



"As Time Goes By" is easily another highlight of this album; Peggy sings this with a lush arrangement that uses the strings and brass to enhance the natural beauty of "As Time Goes By." "If You Go" also puts Peggy's vocals squarely in the spotlight and she never disappoints. Peggy never sounded better!



"Say It Isn't So" gets the royal treatment from Peggy who sings this with all her heart and soul. "I Get Along Without You Very Well" features a Latin themed arrangement which adds to the beauty of the song; and Peggy delivers this so well other female singers would have to be jealous. SMILE



"When I Was A Child" is a pensive ballad that Peggy performs flawlessly; and the album closes with Peggy Lee's fine interpretation of "Smile." "Smile" also gets a Latin type of arrangement and this makes a strong ending to this two-fer CD.



The liner notes reproduce the original cover artwork for the record album releases; and the artwork is most impressive at that!



Peggy Lee fans will love this CD with all the songs from two of her very well done record albums. There's not a single dud in the batch--enjoy!

"

Lovely Selections

I. Kleckner | Evanston, IL USA | 04/07/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I have always liked Peggy Lee but can't say I was a devoted fan. But I recently heard on the radio a song she performed which I had never heard before and was quite taken with the softness of it.



I tracked it to one of these albums. This two disc set contains lovely songs, hearty sentimental oldies but goodies arranged beautifully and performed well. Not sure which shines most, Peggy Lee or the arrangements which bring out the beauty of the music...



"

Pure Protein: No More Perfect Singer

Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 01/28/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"It may not exactly be ominous, but it's far from encouraging to see that this "two-fer" of blue ribbon Peggy Lee LPs is not only an import but ranks no higher than #26 in sales among the Peggy Lee recordings currently on Amazon. Granted, there are a few worthy items ahead of it, but for the most part, your choices among the 25 posted in front of this double-album come down to just two: a "Best of" collection of Peggy's "hit" singles, which are primarily pop ephemera made for Capitol; and, "Black Coffee," her undeniably satisfying if not indispensable jazz session with a quartet led by pianist Jimmy Rowles and trumpeter Pete Candoli. But to the extent people are still buying Peggy Lee, it comes down to "Manana," "Fever," "Big Spender," "Is That All There Is?," "Alley Cat Song," "I'm a Woman," etc.--palatable tunes, certainly, but so narrow and limiting that, far from a good representation, they frankly do a disservice to Peggy Lee, the artist. (Duke Ellington suffers a similar fate, his compositional genius and even band ignored in favor of his pop tunes and a "quickie" date with John Coltrane.)



Appreciating Peggy Lee's place among the giants (Peter Richmond, in his recent biography, calls her the greatest female jazz/pop singer of the 20th century) requires attending to her interpretations of the classic and timeless repertory that she laid down on LPs for both Decca and Capitol. These two Capitol albums--the first with orchestrations tended to by Nelson Riddle and Frank Sinatra; the second, with Quincy Jones responsible for the settings--represent a good start on a project of collecting that, providing the recording companies cooperate, will require a few years to complete. But the reward is considerable. There are few, if any other, singers one can listen to for four or more hours without the least bit of "listener fatigue."



None of the giants among American singers is as "economical" as Peggy. Pick out a standard that's been done by several or more vocalists and just compare. Peggy's is bound to be the briefest, yet there's never a sense of incompleteness, of anything missed or left undone. She gets the story told without an extra chorus of Gordon Jenkins' strings or needless reprises of the same lyric. And she's not afraid of fast tempos (her mental drummer is closer to Art Blakey than to Sinatra's "in the pocket" Basie-style time-keeper). And apparently she had no use for the "3-minute rule" of most commercial recordings: if the final result is less than 2 minutes, so be it. No fat or meat-extenders, just the protein.



In collecting Lee, it's good to remember that the intimate, "breathy" Lee sound required focus, strength and control. The sound is practically unfailingly perfect from 1950-1970, after which Peggy doesn't have the breath support and physical reserves to sustain it consistently (though some of her recordings from the 1980s still pay dividends despite the undeniably tired sound of the voice and the critical sniping). And despite the presence of Quincy Jones on the second half of this double feature, this package does not include what for some of us is Peggy's single most beautiful recording, a song written by Peggy with Johnny Mandel and said to be inspired by Q: "The Shining Sea" (it's well worth the research required to hunt it down. Last I saw, it was on the oop album, "Blues Cross Country").



[Good heavens--now I see this one is no longer available. Don't count on finding these songs in any of those "Best of... " anthologies. Maybe we're doomed as a civilization, after all.]"