Search - Betty Carter :: Priceless Jazz

BEWARE"Priceless" duplicates material from "I Can't Help It"

Miles P. Grier | New York, NY United States | 03/08/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"All of the music on this album is fine, fine stuff. Betty turns in memorable versions of these songs, many of which she revisits and transforms on later Verve albums. The songs tend not to have the idiosyncratic edge that fans of her mroe recent work know so well. This album represents an earlier Betty, inside the tempos and harmonic styles that she later stretches so far. This is not a criticism of the album, merely an observation that the style is different from, though connected to, the one that emerges later.** Important: Most (if not all) of this material is also on the album "I Can't Help It" -- the better of the two because it contains five more tracks than "Priceless." In any case, Betty is always to be recommended! If you are just starting with Betty, this provides a fine introduction. If you own some of her celebrated 80s and 90s Verve albums and want to hear more of her evolution as a singer, then these albums and "Live at the Village Vanguard" will help bridge the gap. Then again, so will "The Betty Carter Album," or "The audience with Betty Carter." In short, five stars for Betty (always)! Three stars to the sneaky record company for releasing old material under a new name!"