Maxine Sullivan - Collection 1937-49 (CD)

Maxine Sullivan was a stylish and versatile jazz and big band singer who was active in music for over half a century into the 1980s but whose most important recordings were during the first decade or so of her career from the late '30s through the 1940s. She came to the fore as vocalist with Claude Thornhill's innovative orchestra, and had a surprise hit with a version of the traditional song "Loch Lomond" which established a professional style and profile which enabled her to work as a solo artist, accompanied not only by Thornhill but by some of the other important names of that era, including John Kirby, Frankie Newton, Charlie Shavers, Bobby Hackett, Teddy Wilson, Benny Carter and Ellis Larkins. This excellent-value 75-track 3-CD set comprises a significant proportion of her recordings from these years as she recorded for the Vocalion, Brunswick, Victor, Bluebird, Decca, Davis, Musicraft, DeLuxe, International and Apollo labels, encompassing performances across the jazz spectrum from big band to sessions in an intimate trio environment, as well as sophisticated renditions of pop songs that place her alongside some of the finest song interpreters of that era. It naturally includes her chart hits "Loch Lomond", "Nice Work If You Can Get It" and "My Ideal". The collection offers a substantial and fairly comprehensive overview of her work during her key formative years, and is also a thoroughly enjoyable showcase for a distinctive and sometimes underestimated talent.

Track List:

Disc: 1

1. Stop, You're Breaking My Heart
2. Gone with the Wind
3. Loch Lomond
4. I'm Coming, Virginia
5. Annie Laurie
6. Blue Skies
7. Don't Save Your Love (For a Rainy Day)
8. Easy to Love
9. Nice Work If You Can Get It
10. The Folks Who Live on the Hill
11. Darling Nellie Gray
12. It's Wonderful
13. You Went to My Head
14. Dark Eyes
15. A Brown Bird Singing
16. Moments Like This
17. Please Be Kind
18. It Was a Lover and His Lass
19. Spring Is Here
20. Down the Old Ox Road
21. St. Louis Blues
22. L' Amour, Toujours L'amour
23. Night and Day
24. It Ain't Necessarily So
25. Kinda Lonesome

Disc: 2

1. Say It with a Kiss
2. I Dream of Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair
3. Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes
4. I'm Happy About the Whole Thing
5. Corn Pickin'
6. Jackie Boy
7. Sing Something Simple
8. Turtle Dove
9. Ill Wind
10. The Hour of Parting
11. If I Had a Ribbon Bow
12. Who Is Sylvia '
13. Molly Malone
14. Barbara Allen
15. That Lonely Tune
16. There I Go
17. The Same Old Story
18. Calm As the Night
19. The Heart You Stole from Me
20. Last Night the Nightingale Woke Me
21. You Mean So Much to Me
22. Midnight
23. What a Diff'rence a Day Made
24. Just Like a Gypsy
25. My Blue Heaven

Disc: 3

1. Kentucky Babe
2. Ma Curly Headed Baby
3. When Your Lover Has Gone
4. My Ideal
5. Beside the River Clyde
6. How Do I Know It's Real'
7. Behavin' Myself for You
8. I Carry the Torch for You
9. The Story of Our Love Affair
10. Confession Is Good for the Soul
11. This Heart of Mine
12. Every Time We Say Goodbye
13. I'm the Caring Kind
14. Looking for a Boy
15. Mad About the Boy
16. I Must Have That Man
17. I Can't Get Started
18. Skylark
19. Come Rain or Come Shine
20. Miss Otis Regrets
21. Takin' My Time
22. Summertime
23. Legalize My Name
24. Cry, Buttercup, Cry
25. Restless