An excellent cd of great songs from a great singer !
06/05/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Most people probably recognize Anita Bryant more for her 1970's orange juice commercials on t.v. and for her outspokenness on the subject of gay rights, but most folks who know Anita for only those two things are really missing out on Anita's great voice. Anita had several hits in the early 1960's-"Paper Roses", "Till There Was You", "My Little Corner of the World", etc. Those are 3 fine songs and Anita's versions are the best. Also here are standouts such as "Pretty Lies", "The World of Lonely People", "Cold, Cold Winter" "The Unopened Letter" and the plum silly "Sleepin' at the Foot of the Bed". Then there's the lovely "The Wedding ( La Novia)" and "Step by Step, Little by Little". Anita Bryant had a great voice like Patsy Cline, and like Patsy recorded some darn good songs! This is a great cd. it wolud have benefited from the inclusion of a few more songs. Anita 's music is romantic and swings!"
I may not like her politics but boy, I love her music
Wilfredo C. Derequito | Dhahran, Saudi Arabia | 01/24/2000
(5 out of 5 stars)
"In this album, Anita Bryant takes us back to the days when life was simpler and songs were still meant to be sung. What better way to celebrate and trek back to that golden age than through her songs. Paper Roses, My Little Corner of the World, The Wedding, Pretty Lies, The Unopened Letter...these are just some of the gems awaiting the listeners.
Unfortunately for Anita Bryant, looks like as an artist, she's being judged - and crucified - not for her music but for her politics! And it's just plain unfair.
It appears quite obvious that many reviewers give Anita Bryant negative ratings not because her performance is mediocre or falls short of their expectation but rather because, well, they disagree with her political beliefs! Jeez, where does it say in the U.S. Constitution, or in the constitution of any other nation on earth for that matter, that an artist must be politically correct before she could be considered a good artist?
If an artist must always be on good behavior before she could truly be appreciated as an artist, then Ludwig van Beethoven, sour, choleric and insufferable that he was, should not even have merited a second's attention in the music world.
I consider myself a liberal and I just strongly disagree with Ms. Bryant's politics which borders on bigotry no matter how I look at it. But, hey, do I have to be in agreement with her political leanings before I could start appreciating her as an artist? I just don't see the connection. I surely would hate it if, say, Barbra Streisand, an artist I so greatly admire - and whose politics I agree with, by the way - is given bad ratings by reviewers from the conservative right simply because of her liberal political leaning. Why, that would be Anita Bryant's case in reverse!
If we allow our biases to affect our judgment as reviewers, it's an easy bet that our ratings will always either be one-star or five-star, determined solely by the rater's politics - rather than by the music's effect on him as listener - which would be truly bad. Besides, suppose we rate an artist based on her politics, where goes our rating if we agree with her about certain political points but disagree on some other points? More importantly, by negatively rating her artistic performance based on her exhibited bigotry, aren't we as raters in effect revealing our own bigotry as well?
Let's cool it a bit, folks. How about if we just separate Anita Bryant's politics from her music and instead just focus on her artistic merits or lack of it? Surely an artist's political leaning and her artistic performance are two different things. Or aren't they?"
A Good Sample Of Anita's Work
austinjeep | Austin, TX USA | 10/22/2002
(5 out of 5 stars)
"This release is really Columbia's "Anita Bryant's Greatest Hits" with the last two tracks added on. Strangely, they chose not to include "Wonderland By Night" which would have made a clean sweep of Anita's Gold records (the other 3, Paper Roses, 'Till There Was You, and In My Little Corner Of The World are all here). Anita had more of her chart hits before signing with Columbia, and the afformentioned 3 tracks all came from her tenure with the small R & B label, Carlton Records. Columbia bought the rights to these when she switched labels in 1961. I believe "The World Of Lonely People" (1964) was her last pop chart hit. "God Bless America" is glaringly out of place in this collection -- It was recorded some years later, though she did record the song in 1963 which might have blended a little better with these tracks. Most of this album is from singles released on Columbia (released for the first time in album form on "Greatest Hits") in 1962. If the producers of this comp wanted to show her versatility, they might have at least given us one of her trademark show stoppers, "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands" or "Battle Hymn Of The Republic."
However, "Greatest Hits" has always been my favorite album of Anita's, and it comes through here clear and strong.
I am a great fan of Anita, the Glamour Queen, and I truly enjoyed her first 3 gospel albums for Columbia, but Anita, the psychotic religious zealot is another story entirely! Great voice: twisted mind."
Yet Another Collectables Disappointment
Wilfredo C. Derequito | 09/01/2007
(3 out of 5 stars)
"Anita Bryant had exactly eleven Billboard Pop Hot 100 single hits, only one of which also made the Adult Contemporary (AC) charts and, in a 14-selection compilation entitled "Golden Classics", Collectables manages to give us all of four. Big whoop! Well actually five if you count Step By Step, Little By Little which was a Hot 100 "bubble under" at # 106 in 1962.
Now, one could be charitable and say that the title reflects, as in the Curb fashion, not necessarily Anita's golden classics, but rather a mix of hers and others. After all, The Wedding, Free, A-Sleepin' At The Foot Of The Bed, Cold, Cold Winter, and God Bless America were solid hits for other artists. But then you get tracks 5, 10, and 12 which were "classics" for no one that I know of, least of all Anita. Hurry Home To Me (track 11) was a minor Country hit in 1970 for Bobby Wright.
The four hits included are: Till There Was You from the Broadway musical The Music Man (# 30 Hot 100 in late summer 1959) b/w Little George (Got The Hiccoughs) and Paper Roses (# 5 Hot 100 in May 1960 b/w Mixed Emotions), both hits with the backing of Monty Kelly's orchestra; In My Little Corner Of The World (# 10 Hot 100 in August 1960 b/w Anyone Would Love You); The World Of Lonely People (# 17 AC/# 59 Hot 100 in June 1964 and her last charted single, b/w It's Better To Cry Today Than To Cry Tomorrow). With the exception of the last, which came on the Columbia label, all her hits were released by Carlton.
A much better "Golden Classics" compilation would have contained the four just mentioned plus: Six Boys And Seven Girls [# 62 in 1959]; Promise Me A Rose (A Slight Detail) which reached # 78 in 1959 and its flipside, Do-Re-Mi which made it to # 94 - all three with the backing of Monty Kelly; One Of The Lucky Ones [# 62 in 1960]; Wonderland By Night [# 18 in 1961 with Lew Douglas & His Orchestra]; A Texan And A Girl From Mexico [# 85 in 1961]; and I Can't Do It By Myself [# 87 in 1961]. And, perhaps, her other "bubble under" - 1964's Welcome, Welcome Home [# 130].
I don't subscribe to the theory expressed in some other reviews that Anita's tumble from the spotlight was precipitated by her controversial comments. Rather, she was just one more in a long list of recording artists who found themselves shunted aside by the British Invasion in 1964. That, and the fact she was just not as good as some of the other female non-R&R pop artists who were competing for attention at the time, such as Barbra Streisand, Dusty Springfield, Betty Everett,Dionne Warwick, and Nancy Wilson, to name a few.
As for this release, I found it highly disappointing from the point of view of us collectors of hit singles."
Anita...not much gold in her career or personal life!
James R. Stewar | Near Tucson, Arizona, USA | 02/25/2009
(2 out of 5 stars)
"Using "Golden Classics" as a selling point for this CD is REALLY stretching things....A LOT! OK, so two or three of the 14 cuts on this release may have made it on Your Hit Parade, it's pretty safe to say the remaining cuts never even got a cardboard sales award! It is rumored that The Beatles were inspired by Anita's hit recording of the "Music Man" gem, "Till There Was You" to cut their own version of the song. "Paper Roses" is probably the single record Bryant is best remembered for...but even this record has been overshadowed by Marie Osmond's hit cover some years later, which pretty much made Anita's recording stale and forgotten. After a string of modestly selling albums for Columbia, the label dumped her long before her well known hate crusade against gays, indicating her career was in trouble years before she claimed political adversaries had derailed it. Her last album for Columbia was a pathetic dud of a love theme album that really showcased Anita's failing vocal abilities along with cornpone arrangements that would put a monkey infused with gallons of Starbucks to sleep. At that time, and sadly, the singer's voice was becoming dark, leathery and unappealing with a drastic loss of range long before its time. But on she forged with the sacred label Word out of Wacco, Texas. It seemed like a solid home for the often sacred singer, but Anita's output with the label lacked inspiration and all their efforts paled in comparison to her sacred releases with Columbia (especially the pop-inspriational Columbia album, "I Beleive"). Certainly the most embarassing release of her entire career was a lack-luster, unspired live religious album with Word which was released not long before they showed her the door (most likely due to massive compliants from record buyers offended by Bryant's hate crusades, along with dismal record sales and that failing voice). On this live recording, the singer offered unending testimonies about how she was grand enough to lead her flocks to The Lord if they bought her records and books...it was obvious that Anita now believed The Lord was an employee of Anita Bryant ministries...the time left on the LP consisted of poorly performed & darkly arranged sacred tunes. Along her career path, Bryant managed to write a long series of books for religious publishers mostly offering Anita's guidence on how to have a perfect family like her's. However, even her most ardent supporters jumped off The Good Gospel Ship Anita Bryant, after she dumped her first husband, the father of her children and the co-subject of her happy family sagas. One of the last straws for her public was an outlandish, interview Anita Bryant actually granted with Playboy magazine...where she discussed everything from her political crusades to her orgasims. To top it all, reports have surfaced that one of Anita's sons has been outted as being gay. With a career that nose-dived into financial ruin and a failing voice, bankruptcies were not far away via theaters Bryant and her latest husband established in places like Branson, Missouri and Pidgeon Forge, Tennesse, that went bottoms-up, while Anita prayed with casts & employees, guarenteeing the Lord's blessing on everyone that stuck with her...she would secretly 'get out of Dodge', leaving a few ticket holders in the lurch, and bilking employess and fellow performers out of back pay, including one of her loyal fan club members. Many believe it was actually her failing career, including being dumped by Columbia Records, that prompted MS Bryant to try to jump start her failing career with her ugly policical crusade, rather than any kind of religious conviction. Finding work almost non-existance in this new century, and finding she wasn't welcome in several states due to bankruptcies, MS Bryant is reviving "Anita Bryant Ministeries" online in a desperate and sadly pathetic attempt at financial survival...I can't help but wonder if she's seeking a new Playboy interview to bring things full circle! Unlike everyother artist that was popualr when Bryant enjoyed her biggest success, there has been no interest or demand in issuing her recorded material on CD's...with this one exception."
Track Listings (14) - Disc #1
