Favorites in Stereo | |
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Studio album by | |
Released | 1959 |
Recorded | 1957 and 1958, New York, NY and Hollywood, CA, USA |
Genre | operetta, pop |
Length | 32:15 |
Label | RCA |
Producer | Simon Rady, Ed Welker |
Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
Allmusic | [1] |
Favorites in Stereo is a studio album by Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. The album was recorded in stereo and released by RCA Records in 1959. [1] For its monaural release the title was changed to Favorites in Hi-Fi. The album peaked at number 40 on the Billboard 200 chart. [2] It was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America on October 27, 1966. [3]
Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald were a popular romantic screen team in a series of eight motion pictures produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer between 1935 and 1941. [4] The two reunited on a 1957 broadcast of the CBS Television series The Big Record starring Patti Page. Their performance of the "Italian Street Song" from their first film together, Naughty Marietta (1935) created a renewed interest for the team. As a result, RCA brought them together to record Favorites in Stereo. [5] During its making, MacDonald feared that the changing music tastes of the public would cause the album to underperform, and was pleasantly surprised about the album's success. [6]
The album was popular with critics and audiences, selling over one million copies. [7] In his review of the album music critic, Bruce Eder, noted: "The results are impressive, even though both singers' voices had darkened somewhat since their heyday of the '30s – the dimensionality of stereo separation is not pushed artificially, but the division of the voices and the perspective of the orchestral accompaniments does allow for some superb listening moments, particularly on "Italian Street Song" on side one." [1]
The Democrat and Chronicle added: "[The album] showed the two singers in peak form." [6] Phil Sheridan for The Philadelphia Inquirer made the album his Album Choice, predicting that "young and old will embrace this album" and praised the "memorable" performances as "singing in grand style[.]" [8]
No. | Title | Lyrics | Music | Performed by | Length |
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1. | "Will You Remember?" (from Maytime ) | Rida Johnson Young | Sigmund Romberg | Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy | 2:48 |
2. | "Rosalie" (from Rosalie ) | Cole Porter | Porter | Eddy | 2:29 |
3. | "Giannina Mia" (from The Firefly ) | Otto Harbach | Rudolf Friml | MacDonald | 2:16 |
4. | "Rose Marie" (from Rose Marie ) | Otto Harbach and Oscar Hammerstein II | Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart | Eddy | 3:02 |
5. | "Italian Street Song" (from Naughty Marietta ) | Rida Johnson Young | Victor Herbert | MacDonald | 2:16 |
6. | "Indian Love Call" (from Rose-Marie) | Harbach and Hammerstein | Friml and Stothart | MacDonald and Eddy | 2:16 |
No. | Title | Lyrics | Music | Performed by | Length |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1. | "Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life" (from Naughty Marietta) | Young | Herbert | MacDonald and Eddy | 3:19 |
2. | "The Breeze and I" | Al Stillman | Ernesto Lecuona | MacDonald | 2:32 |
3. | "While My Lady Sleeps" | Bronisław Kaper | Gus Kahn | Eddy | 3:26 |
4. | "Wanting You" (from New Moon ) | Hammerstein | Romberg | MacDonald and Eddy | 3:03 |
5. | "Stouthearted Men" (from New Moon) | Hammerstein | Romberg | Eddy | 2:24 |
6. | "Beyond the Blue Horizon" (from Monte Carlo ) | Leo Robin, Richard A. Whiting, and W. Franke Harling | Robin, Whiting, and Harling | MacDonald | 2:24 |
Jeanette Anna MacDonald was an American singer and actress best remembered for her musical films of the 1930s with Maurice Chevalier and Nelson Eddy. During the 1930s and 1940s she starred in 29 feature films, four nominated for Best Picture Oscars, and recorded extensively, earning three gold records. She later appeared in opera, concerts, radio, and television. MacDonald was one of the most influential sopranos of the 20th century, introducing opera to film-going audiences and inspiring a generation of singers.
Nelson Ackerman Eddy was an American actor and baritone singer who appeared in 19 musical films during the 1930s and 1940s, as well as in opera and on the concert stage, radio, television, and in nightclubs. A classically trained baritone, he is best remembered for the eight films in which he costarred with soprano Jeanette MacDonald. He was one of the first "crossover" stars, a superstar appealing both to shrieking bobby soxers and opera purists, and in his heyday, he was the highest paid singer in the world.
The New Moon is an operetta with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, Frank Mandel, and Laurence Schwab. The show was the third in a string of Broadway hits for Romberg written in the style of Viennese operetta. Set in 1792, shortly before the French Revolution, the story centers on a young French aristocrat in disguise, who has fled his country and falls in love with the daughter of a prominent New Orleans planter.
Rose-Marie is an operetta-style musical with music by Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart, and book and lyrics by Otto Harbach and Oscar Hammerstein II. The story is set in the Canadian Rocky Mountains and concerns Rose-Marie La Flemme, a French Canadian girl who loves miner Jim Kenyon. When Jim falls under suspicion for murder, her brother Emile plans for Rose-Marie to marry Edward Hawley, a city man.
Earthbound is a live album by the band King Crimson, released in 1972 as a budget record shortly after the line-up that recorded it had broken up. It contains the band's first official live release of their signature song "21st Century Schizoid Man", and an extended live version of their 1970 non-LP B-side "Groon". It also contains two improvised tracks with scat vocals from Boz Burrell.
Maytime is a 1937 American musical and romantic-drama film produced by MGM. It was directed by Robert Z. Leonard, and stars Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. The screenplay was rewritten from the book for Sigmund Romberg's 1917 operetta Maytime by Rida Johnson Young, Romberg's librettist; however, only one musical number by Romberg was retained.
Elvis Is Back! is the fourth studio album by American rock and roll singer Elvis Presley, released on April 8, 1960 by RCA Victor. It was Presley's first album released in stereo. Recorded over two sessions in March and April, the album marked Presley's return to recording after his discharge from the U.S. Army. It was Presley's first album of new material since Elvis' Christmas Album was issued in 1957.
Donald Alton Fagerquist was a small group, big band, and studio jazz trumpet player from the West Coast of the United States.
Sweethearts is a 1938 American Technicolor musical romance film directed by W.S. Van Dyke and starring Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. The screenplay, by Dorothy Parker and Alan Campbell, uses the “play within a play” device: a Broadway production of the 1913 Victor Herbert operetta is the setting for another pair of sweethearts, the stars of the show. It was the first color film for Nelson or Jeanette. It was their first film together without uniforms or period costumes.
Cliff is the 1959 debut album of British singer Cliff Richard and his band the Drifters. The recording is the first white professionally recorded live rock and roll album.
The Girl of the Golden West is a 1938 American musical Western film adapted from the 1905 play of the same name by David Belasco, better known for providing the plot of the opera La fanciulla del West by Giacomo Puccini. A frontier woman falls in love with an outlaw.
Rose Marie is a 1936 American musical film starring Jeanette MacDonald, Nelson Eddy, and Reginald Owen that was directed by W. S. Van Dyke. It was the second of three movie adaptations from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer of the 1924 Broadway musical of the same name. A silent version was released in 1928 and a color film in 1954. All three versions are set in the Canadian wilderness. Portions of Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart's original score for the Broadway musical are utilized in both the 1936 and 1954 films.
What's That I Hear?: The Songs of Phil Ochs is a 1998 tribute compilation to the music of the late Phil Ochs. The various performers cover several generations of Ochs' admirers. All profits from the album's sales were divided equally between the non-profits, the ACLU Foundation of Southern California and Sing Out! Magazine.
Bitter Sweet is a 1940 American Technicolor musical film directed by W. S. Van Dyke, based on the operetta Bitter Sweet by Noël Coward. It was nominated for two Academy Awards, one for Best Cinematography and the other for Best Art Direction by Cedric Gibbons and John S. Detlie.
"Indian Love Call" is a popular song from Rose-Marie, a 1924 operetta-style Broadway musical with music by Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart, and book and lyrics by Otto Harbach and Oscar Hammerstein II. Originally written for Mary Ellis, the song achieved continued popularity under other artists and has been called Friml's best-remembered work.
Orienta is an album by The Markko Polo Adventurers released in 1959. The album was produced by Simon Rady, arranged and conducted by Gerald Fried and recorded in stereo in Hollywood, California. The album uses a combination of sound effects and Asian-inspired music to tell humorous vignettes. Its suggestive cover art features a photograph by Murray Laden.
"Beyond the Blue Horizon" is a 1930 song composed by Leo Robin, Richard A. Whiting, and W. Franke Harling, and was first performed by Jeanette MacDonald in the 1930 film Monte Carlo. It was released that November as a single on a 78 rpm disc along with the song "Always, in All Ways" on Victor Records. Four takes were recorded on August 4 at the Hollywood Recording Studio, conducted by LeRoy Shield, with MacDonald and the vocal group The Rounders; the second take was chosen for release.
Philip L. Bodner was an American jazz clarinetist and studio musician who also played flute, oboe, saxophone, and English horn.
American actress/singer Jeanette MacDonald recorded over 50 songs during her film career for RCA Victor and its foreign counterparts. Due to the limited statistics released to the public, it is not certain how many songs and singles she has released or their exact popularity in music charts, although she has officially recorded eight studio albums and released seven compilation albums. Despite soundtracks for musical films not becoming a concept until the 1940s, many of her singles were re-recordings of songs she had performed in the movies ; her first "album" was the single "Dream Lover"/"March of the Grenadiers" (1930) on 78 rpm discs for The Love Parade. She also recorded a cover album of songs featured in Sigmund Romberg's Up in Central Park in 1945 with Robert Merrill, as well as non-English records during her 1931 European tour.
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