Search - Various Artists :: Sophisticated Ladies

This is a fantastic re-issue

07/17/1999

(4 out of 5 stars)

"It is risible to claim that most of these singers have been forgotten; there have been many LP and CD re-issues. Nevertheless this contains many rare and hard-to-get items of real girl power, most of them started singing in their teens and attracted the best session musicians. I would have been happier listening to Kate Smith (perhaps the Charleston Chasers session) in preference to Helen Morgan. And a few of the tracks suffer from surface noise that should have been overcome. But these are minor cavils, and far outweighed by the delights; the lost innocence that is effortlessly captured by the Annette Hanshaw tracks, the electrifying introduction by Frances Langford to "Stormy Weather", the sheer power generated by The Boswell Sisters swing (in contrast, Connie's solo tracks are quite sedate affairs). And listening to Ethel Waters "I Just Couldn't Take It Baby" made me wonder how much she'd been influenced by Sophie Tucker - or was it the other way round?Nan Wynn may have come to the fore merely in the absence of Billie Holiday but how providential that was can be heard clearly on her two featured tracks, and leaves one wanting more. Similarly, Ginny Simms deserves to be better known and her second track features the great Eddie South - an added bonus indeed.So four stars out of five but an unreserved recommendation that you splash out the modest purchase price and hear what the best girl singers had to offer while they had the chance."