[78-L] Listen, all you New Yorkers .....

[Randy Watts]

Forgot about SEVEN DREAMS. Haven't heard that in ages. Didn't Jenkins write a song cycle, or whatever you want to call them, about California, too? Or am I thinking of Mel Torme's CALIFORNIA SUITE?

Randy 

--- On Mon, 2/8/10, David Lennick <dlennick at sympatico.ca> wrote:

> What, no lacerating opinions of SEVEN
> DREAMS? I can't stomach that one myself 
> but we always had requests for it.
> 
> dl
> 
> Randy Watts wrote:
> > Capitol's MANHATTAN TOWER was released a couple of
> years ago by both DRG and Sepia. DRG's CD is a licensed
> reissue from Capitol and sounds fine. I haven't heard
> Sepia's version and can't comment on that one.
> > 
> > If the Decca reissue of MANHATTAN TOWER you mention
> was on the Razor & Tie GORDON JENKINS COLLECTION disc
> from Universal Special Products, then yeah, it was poorly
> done. I've got another Razor & Tie/Universal Special
> Products collection of some of Ethel Merman's Decca sides,
> released around the same time, and it's equally slipshod.
> Some of the material--the ANNIE GET YOUR GUN sides, as I
> recall--was apparently transferred from Decca's 'simulated
> stereo' LP masters. Which is useful, I suppose, in case
> you've forgotten what an awful thing fake stereo was.
> > 
> > Will Friedwald wrote the liner notes for the Razor
> & Tie Jenkins collection and he's no fan of MANHATTAN
> TOWER or other Jenkins compositions that were in the same
> vein. He had similar harsh opinions of Jenkins' THE LETTER
> and WHAT IT WAS, WAS LOVE.
> > 
> > Randy
> > 
> >  
> > 
> > --- On Mon, 2/8/10, DAVID BURNHAM <burnhamd at rogers.com>
> wrote:
> > 
> >> This year, on May 12, it will be
> >> Gordon Jenkins' 100th birthday.  I'm
> wondering if
> >> "Manhattan Tower" still has a life.  (I
> realize many people
> >> would answer, "Did it ever have a life?") 
> Recently, I was
> >> watching an episode of CSI NY, and during the
> opening
> >> montage music, which is always pretty dense, there
> was this
> >> snippet from Manhattan Tower - nothing more or
> less than
> >> "Listen, all you New Yorkers".  Strangely
> that line was
> >> sung by a man, although in the work it is sung by
> the woman,
> >> (Julie).  I was curious how anyone young
> enough to work on
> >> that show would be old enough to even know
> Manhattan
> >> Tower.  I only have two recordings of it: the
> two record
> >> set by Decca and the much longer version which
> came out
> >> about 10 years later on Capitol using the same
> cast,
> >> (Elliott Lewis and Beverly Mahr).  I think an
> ideal length
> >> for the piece would be somewhere between these
> two.  The
> >> first omits the love story completely while the
> second has
> >> some, (IMO),
> >>  tedious songs - "Happiness Cocktail",
> "Repeat After Me"
> >> and "Once Upon a Dream", which puts words to the
> theme tune
> >> of the piece, including such meaningless metaphors
> as "a
> >> dawn without a sunrise", (hello Mr. Jenkins, a
> dawn IS a
> >> sunrise).  But let me not ridicule the
> piece.  I do enjoy
> >> it and I found a pristine copy of the Capitol LP
> in a used
> >> record store in Ann Arbor which I have mastered
> onto a CD,
> >> since no commercial CD exists, and occasionally
> play in the
> >> car.  Some, (I think), excellent songs added
> in this
> >> version are "learnin' my Latin" and "Married I can
> always
> >> get".
> >>
> >> According to the notes on the LP, the piece has
> enjoyed a
> >> huge success, (at least up to 1956), being played
> annually
> >> in Atlanta (?!) as well as many other venues
> around the
> >> country.  I don't know if the original Decca
> version was
> >> abridged at the time or if that is all there was
> to the
> >> piece then.  That version has been issued by
> Decca on a CD
> >> but the booklet belittles the piece, "...the
> written
> >> narration is so hokey it's hysterical." 
> Also, surprisingly
> >> for Decca, the remastering is very
> slip-shod.  The sound
> >> quality isn't great and each side of the 78s is
> left hanging
> >> for several seconds before it carries on. 
> Anyone who knows
> >> the work and the recording knows that side 1 ends
> with a
> >> musical phrase which is repeated at the beginning
> of side
> >> two, an easy edit and side two ends on the same
> note as
> >> starts side three, once again, child's play to put
> together,
> >> (sides three to four can just be joined).  In
> the booklet
> >> for this version it calls Manhattan
> >>  Tower one of the "signature works of the LP
> era" and
> >> mentions that Patty Page and Robert Goulet also
> recorded
> >> full length versions of it.  These are
> recordings I have
> >> never seen.
> >>
> >> (Later the same day)
> >>
> >> I have just gone to e-bay and discovered that the
> Capitol
> >> version has just come out on CD, but no label is
> mentioned
> >> so it might just be the product of a free-lancer
> like
> >> myself who has copied the LP.  I wish a label
> like "Oldies"
> >> would issue it from the master tape.  The
> Robert Goulet
> >> version was issued on a stereo Columbia LP, but I
> can't find
> >> anyone selling a copy of it, and I just purchased
> the Patti
> >> Page version on a Mercury LP.
> >>
> >> db