Album Reviews

Very few singers can get this close to a dry microphone, be balanced way forward of the backup band and sound as good as Peggy Lee does on this series of standards backed by a pair of small ensembles, recorded in 1953 and 1956. Neither the original nor the reissue notes explain the album’s temporal context so perhaps there’s no story there.

Don’t expect the deep, sultry “Fever” edition of Peggy Lee. She was younger, less mature and less able to strike a convincing emotional pose, though her technique is impeccable and her spontaneity impressive. She sounds more like the old school big band singer that she was (with Benny Goodman) than the more intimate, expressive one she became.

Musically and sonically this album sounds dated compared to Julie is Her Name, though they were recorded around the same time. Actually, I think it’s easy to tell which tracks are from 1953 and which are from 1956: some sound noticeably better, with greater dynamics and bandwidth. Lee is more formal than London, more reserved and more like the farm girl from North Dakota that she was, than like the suburban temptress London. Lee would get there eventually, but not on this record.

There’s a lot of Ella Fitzerald in this era Peggy Lee. Listen to “Love Me Or Leave Me” and you’ll hear Ella. In fact, if you like Ella’s style of singing, which, like Lee’s here is also strangely a-sexual and emotionally cool even when the intent was greater heat, you’ll like Lee here, though when she sings “My Heart Belongs to Daddy” you’ll be thinking only “father.”

The arrangements (not credited) vary between low key and effective and corny and even kitschy—with the better sounding tracks also having the more modern sounding, more sophisticated ones. Backing credits include Jimmy Rowles or Lou Levy on piano (who coincidentally plays on Ella’s Clap Hands Here Comes Charlie Cootie Chesterfield or Pete Candoli on trombone and Ed Shaughnessy or Larry Bunker on drums. There are no arranger credits.

This is Peggy Lee finding her way in the post war, post big-band era. She found her way at Capitol a few years later.