Positively The Most / Softly, The Brazilian Sound

60年代ジャズ・ヴォーカル/ポップス・ファンに絶大な人気を誇るヴォーカリスト、ジョニー・ソマーズの代表作2作が、2イン1で登場！「Positively The Most」は、1961年にリリースされた彼女のファースト・アルバムでアート・ペッパーらが参加した人気ジャズ・ヴォーカル作品。そして、かねてからブラジル音楽に興味を持っていた彼女が、ローリンド・アルメイダと制作したブラジリアン・ポップ・アルバム「Softly, The Brazilian Sound」がカップリング。ブラジル/ボサノヴァ・スタンダードのカバーは勿論、オリジナル作品も収録した彼女のアルバムの中でも、近年一番の人気を誇るアルバムです。ナイスプライスでのリイシューはウレシイ限り！

ollectors' Choice Music continues their assessment of Joanie Sommers' late-'50s and early-'60s Warner Brothers' releases with this double-play CD containing her inaugural long player Positively the Most (1959) as well as her thematic seventh project, Softly, The Brazilian Sound (1964). Between these platters -- both featuring Sommers in a more adult contemporary setting -- she would score her biggest hit and sole Top 40 single, "Johnny Get Angry." However, it was the oh-so-modest text on the LP jacket Positively the Most that proudly proclaimed the 19-year-old vocalist as "...the greatest discovery in singing...in the last fifteen years." All hyperbole aside, Sommers did bring a beaucoup of talent -- which included a remarkable breadth of interpretive skills for someone of such a tender age. Positively the Most is an accurately self-descriptive title consisting of a dozen adeptly executed entries lifted from the Great American Songbook by arrangers Tommy Oliver and Marty Paich. They respectively reworked and modernized multiple numbers from Cole Porter ("My Heart Belongs to Daddy" and "So in Love") to Duke Ellington ("Just Squeeze Me" and "I'm Beginning to See the Light"). Sommers' torch ballads "Heart & Soul," "What's New," and "Oh, But I Do" are uniformly excellent, as is the rave-up of "Old Devil Moon" and the soulful "Just Too Young for the Blues." Four years and half-a-dozen albums later, Sommers and Laurindo Almeida (guitarist/arranger) created Softly, The Brazilian Sound (1964). Prior to his collaborations with Frank Sinatra, Antonio Carlos Jobim's name had already begun cropping up occasionally as a wide array of musicians were incorporating his composition into their repertoires. Sommers is no exception and her readings of his "Meditation (Meditacao)" and "Quiet Nights (Corcovado)" are both well above average. Even better are Almeida's slightly samba-tized scores to the easygoing "Softly, As I Leave You," a brisk "I Could Have Danced All Night" and the blues-infused "You Can't Go Home." Enthusiasts of Johnny Mercer are encouraged to check out "Old Guitaron" -- which he co-penned with Almeida -- revealing Sommers' most siren-inspired delivery as she exudes an organic charm that simply can't be faked. Collectors' Choice Music has continued to systematically issue Sommers' back catalog and interested parties should be aware that Look Out! It's Joanie Sommers (1962), Johnny Get Angry (1962), Let's Talk About Love (1962), and For Those Who Think Young (1963) are once again available. ~ Lindsay Planer|