Search - Ted Lewis :: A Million Memories

Robert S. (stoner2) from LOS ANGELES, CA
Reviewed on 9/3/2009...

Being a collector of the Music of Tin Pan Alley this was a must. Ted Lewis was a major player in his time. Ted Lewis Sofie Tucker Al Jolson Jimmy Durante Legendary all.
The quality of the recordings most impressive mind you they re-recorded towards the end of his career.

Ted Lewis Grabs an Audience

E F Isaacs | 11/05/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"From the list of songs, this appears to a duplicate of the new Lewis cassette ( and CD) from the Good Music Co. of Holmes, Pa. Their web site may be yestermusic.com . The album was recorded in Lewis' 67th year (1957); he was still an active performer. The sound quality (on my tape) is superior, like new; the album was expensively produced, with a full orchestra and very professional arrangements. Lewis gives a fine performance in his remarkable style, apparently little changed from the first quarter of the 20th Century. His singing is not as strong as it may once have been, yet his specialty was an enthusiastic, upbeat, carnival barker/medicine show TALKING of his songs -- very much an early 20th century phenomenon, and never done better than by Lewis -- perhaps never equalled. I believe Sophie Tucker is Lewis' feminine counterpart in this technique. Yet Lewis' extremely positive, upbeat themes are somewhat unique to him, or at least the infectious conviction with which he sells them is. Lewis has much to teach any who would stand before an audience and hold them with a song. That is an understatement, I think. He has the "stage presence" -- the attitude toward an audience that wins their full attention -- of Jolson, or Cantor, or early Bob Dylan. He learned it in a lifetime of performance. We may dream of learning it by studying his work. I used to have a better Lewis album, of similar material, recorded (I guessed) maybe ten years earlier, when both his voice and band were punchier. Yet this album is a worthy substitute, I feel...I do not know what else is available."