Search - Dick Haymes :: Golden Years of Dick Haymes [ORIGINAL RECORDINGS REMASTERED]

Great Price, Great pressings

DodgyUSA | Jamaica Plain, MA United States | 01/06/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This Jasmine Music collection of Dick Haymes on 4 cds with over 100 tracks is a great price!For collectors of Haymes some of the tracks are duplicated on other recordings but this is definitely worth the price.
Duets with Helen Forrest, Bing Crosby, the Andrew Sisters (I guess that counts as a quartet !) are all represented.
The pressings are clean and the sound is wonderful. Highly recommended."

"Golden" Indeed!

Dr. Glenn W. Briggs | KSC, Florida & Chengdu, China | 05/08/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Dick Haymes had one of the most mellow voices of the early bona fide crooners, and this collection is "golden" indeed! It is virtually a "complete" collection of his very best work. He was among the best crooners of an era that brought forth many, such as the early Sinatra and the great Buddy Clark. If you enjoy great baritones, rank Dick with the two named above, and such true crooners as Jack Jones, Matt Monro, Steve Lawrence, Perry Como, Don Cherry, and John Gary. For those of you who are too young to recall these super male singers, you have no idea what you are missing - like, real music."

Excellent balladeer of the forties

Peter Durward Harris | Leicester England | 03/30/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Dick Haymes really wanted to be a songwriter, but nobody was interested in his writing - however, they liked his voice and he ended up having a very successful career as a singer. I notice that none of the songs here credit Dick as a songwriter, so I assume that he gave up his ambitions in that direction. As a singer, Dick started his career as a singer with Harry James and had a couple of top ten hits during that time. However, one record that didn't chart upon initial release in 1941, I'll get by, made number one when re-issued in 1944. By that time, Dick had firmly established his solo career, but the bonus hit would presumably have come as a welcome bonus.



Dick's solo career started with a flourish in 1943, his first two A-sides (You'll never know, It can't be wrong) both making number one, while their B-sides charted in their own right, both easily making the top ten. Dick never made number one again except for the already-mentioned re-release of I'll get by, but he had plenty of other top ten hits, including several excellent duets with Helen Forrest. All their seven top ten hits together are featured here, but the equivalent Helen Forrest compilation contains all 18 of their duets. Wisely, the compilers of this set didn't duplicate all 18 duets here.



Of the solo tracks here, perhaps the most famous song is Love letters, which didn't make the top ten for Dick, though it came close despite being the B-side of Till the end of time (a top three hit for Dick, but a number one hit for Perry Como). Love letters appears to have gone almost un-noticed until Ketty Lester covered it and had a huge international hit with it in the sixties. Elvis Presley followed suit a couple of years later. Alison Moyet had a huge UK hit with the song in the eighties. All of which shows that you can't hide a good song. Another song here, The more I see you, also inspired a sixties cover that became an international hit, this time by Chris Montez. At least the potential of the song was recognized first time around, Dick's version having been released as an A-side and becoming a top ten hit.



Helen Forrest is not the only female singer guest in this compilation, as there are also eight duets with the Andrews sisters (three of which also feature Bing Crosby), three duets with the Patty Andrews, two duets with Judy Garland and one duet each with Evelyn Knight, Ethel Merman and Eileen Wilson. Between them, these duets produced four minor hits, so the public definitely preferred Helen Forrest as Dick's duet partner, However, these duets are interesting in their own way. Fans of the Andrews sisters in particular have plenty of reason to invest in this set. I have a lot of Andrews sisters compilations and some of the duets featured here are new to me.



There is plenty of great music here by a balladeer who was a major star in his time. If you enjoy those other great male balladeers of the forties, Bing Crosby and Perry Como, you'll love Dick's music - and it's unlikely that there will ever be a better collection of it than this one."