Search - Stella Parton :: Anthology

Brilliant but under-rated singer

Peter Durward Harris | Leicester England | 04/13/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Several of these tracks (including the hits) are re-recordings that first appeared on a CD titled Favorites Vol 1 (there never was a Vol 2), but they are superbly done and the originals are even harder to find on CD than this collection. Indeed, some of the originals have never been released on CD at all. To those of you who must have the originals, look elsewhere or wait for another CD release that may take years to appear, if it appears at all. For those who simply want to hear some of Stella's great music on CD, this is brilliant.



Stella began her career superbly with the top ten country hit, I want to hold you in my dreams tonight (here as a re-recording). It seemed that she was going to succeed despite being Dolly's sister. Although she had more country hits in the late seventies, Stella never had the level of success that her talent merited. Nevertheless, she recorded a series of brilliant albums and continues to do so. This anthology bring together some of her best music.



Stella's first album, released on a small label, contained not only I want to hold you in my dreams tonight, but also Ode to Olivia (sadly not included here), a song about the state of country music back then - more than twenty years before Alan Jackson and George Strait sang about Murder on Music Row.



After that, Stella was signed up to a major label and recorded three fantastic albums that I played frequently at the time. As these represent the most successful period of her career, it may seem surprising that only seven tracks from them are included here (tracks 2 to 7 and track 11) but clearly Renaissance did not have access to the original masters, so the only songs they could include were re-recordings. Among those tracks are Danger of a stranger (a top forty pop hit in Britain), Stormy weather (a cover of a Leo Sayer song) and Steady as the rain (written by Dolly, but not recorded by her until twenty years later - eventually as a track on Grass is blue, but very different from Stella's version).



Despite the high quality of those albums, they did not sell enough. Since then, Stella has recorded for various small labels and those recordings make up the other fifteen tracks. These tracks include fine covers of the fifties classic Young love and Bruce Hornsby's Mandolin rain. There is a great fun song (Legs) that was the only new song on that Favorites Vol 1 collection from which the re-recordings are taken. There area also some lovely romantic songs, often co-written by Stella. Some of the later songs are also re-recordings but some are originals.



Despite several of the songs being re-recordings, this is a brilliant anthology, well worth looking for."

High Energy Music From A Great Entertainer

Larry Wisse | Marysville, Oh United States | 08/04/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This CD is a collection of great music that is very well done. I love the arrangements of each tune. Stella singing is right on and she sings each tune with high energy and much feeling, making this cd a pleasure listen to over and over again. The song "Legs" is great fun. "Mandolin Rain" and "Like Lovers Do" are my favorites on this CD."