Search - Doris Day, Harry James :: Young Man With a Horn

Young Man With a Horn
Doris Day, Harry James
Young Man With a Horn
Genres: Jazz, Pop, Broadway & Vocalists
 
  •  Track Listings (13) - Disc #1

The 1950 film Young Man with a Horn has a special place in the iconography of jazz as the first full-scale Hollywood treatment of the jazz musician as tortured genius, with Kirk Douglas first essaying the role he would lat...  more »

     
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CD Details

All Artists: Doris Day, Harry James
Title: Young Man With a Horn
Members Wishing: 3
Total Copies: 0
Label: Sony
Original Release Date: 1/1/1950
Re-Release Date: 6/15/1999
Album Type: Extra tracks, Original recording remastered
Genres: Jazz, Pop, Broadway & Vocalists
Styles: Swing Jazz, Traditional Jazz & Ragtime, Vocal Jazz, Oldies, Vocal Pop, Traditional Vocal Pop
Number of Discs: 1
SwapaCD Credits: 1
UPC: 074646550823

Synopsis

Amazon.com
The 1950 film Young Man with a Horn has a special place in the iconography of jazz as the first full-scale Hollywood treatment of the jazz musician as tortured genius, with Kirk Douglas first essaying the role he would later perfect as Vincent van Gogh in Lust for Life. Though the film was based very loosely on the life of Bix Beiderbecke, his introspective music was jettisoned in favor of more conventional, flamboyant, bravura trumpeting (suggesting Bunny Berigan as an alternative model for the self-destructive hero). At the time, Doris Day was making the transition from band singer to a specialist in "good girl" movie roles, and she does a fine job on the film's torchy standards, especially "With a Song in My Heart," singing with a clear, distinctive voice that is so unaffected that it seems like a conduit for a songwriter's intentions. Harry James brings his rhythmic drive and sparkling technique to the soundtrack's hybrid of swing and '20s jazz, while his gorgeous sound is most striking on the lush, frankly Gershwin-inspired "Melancholy Rhapsody." --Stuart Broomer

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CD Reviews

Almost fabulous
08/19/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)

"The album is representative Doris Day 1950. BUT if you have heard the actual film version you will be disappointed. Her performance on this album is very perfunctory to say the least.She sings with everything she`s got in the film version. The trouble is that singers tend to perform under stringent standards for the motion picture and give an indifferent approach to the commercial recording. Examples abound: FRANK SINATRA performed without much expression the song Someone to Watch Over Me in the commercial soundtrack album. He gave a classic rendition in the actual film, emotion and all. BARBRA STREISAND did the same for The Way We Were. Need I say more. Still, this album is very good value."
Where'd the BASS Go?
Mike DiMartino | Rochester, NY | 12/31/2009
(4 out of 5 stars)

"We had to put up with decades of disappointment back when Columbia would again and again reissue their classics but with that awful Simulated Stereo process (fake stereo from mono original recordings). Even into the '80s with Columbia's Masterpieces series, they continued to add stereo reverb and issue random complilations instead of whole complete LPs, often dispensing with the original cover art. Thankfully, Legacy came along, and at last we truly hear what makes these masterpieces of reissue excellence, such as the magnificent Complete Duke Ellington at Newport, uncut, in the original stereo it was recorded in and with loads of photos.



When I see the LEGACY logo, I'm usually assured of getting the original audio. However, in this case, YOUNG MAN WITH A HORN, the LP blows away this CD. Buy one in excellent shape on eBay and compare (note the LP has a different cover than the 10" EP cover used for this CD issue). The LP audio is so open--Harry's horn is so big and full, Doris Day sounds like she's right up to the mic--and there's tons of bass--almost tuba like--and a kickin' bass drum too. Legacy obviously overcompressed (choked) the 1950 sound stage recording of its huge, sonorous ambience.



Legacy: you're almost there--just take a lesson from the Japanese: stop messing with the sound and trying to make it something it was never engineered to be.



This music gets FIVE stars, of course, paticularly tunes like "Melancholy Rhapsody" "Would I Love You?" and "Limehouse Blues" (which again shows Harry James played more than schmaltz; for that matter, go listen to his '30s recordings with Chu Berry)."