Richard Rodgers Album With Oscar Hammerstein CD

Composer: Richard Rodgers.
Lyricist: Oscar Hammerstein II.
Personnel: Bobby Tucker Singers, Billy Williams & Choir (vocals); Salvatore Gioe (piano).
Audio Remasterer: Charlie Crump.
Liner Note Author: Tony Middleton .
Translator: Hans Korbmacher.
Commemorating Richard Rodgers' centenary, this compilation presents recordings of 25 songs the composer wrote with his second major collaborator, Oscar Hammerstein II, from the early '40s to the early '50s. Rodgers & Hammerstein went on collaborating until Hammerstein's death in 1960, but the 2002 album is able to present tracks recorded only up through 1951 because it is taking advantage of the 50-year European copyright limit on recordings to assemble recordings originally released on various labels but now in the public domain. So, nothing from The Sound of Music, which dates from 1959, could be included. But Rodgers & Hammerstein's other major shows, Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, and The King and I, are represented in pop-oriented recordings made by the major singers of the era. Nine of the tracks are ones that made the charts for their performers, including Perry Como's number one version of "Some Enchanted Evening" and Top Ten treatments of "It Might as Well Be Spring" (bandleader Sammy Kaye with Billy Williams on vocals), "That's for Me" (Jo Stafford), and "Oh, What a Beautiful Morning" (Bing Crosby and Trudy Erwin) that were the recordings most favored by radio listeners and record buyers. Although this is a British compilation, most of the performers are Americans, the exception being Lita Roza, "one of England's biggest stars of the 1950s," according to the liner notes, who sings "I'm Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair." The performances are always respectful, and sometimes surprising, such as Danny Kaye's straightforward reading of "There Is Nothing Like a Dame" and Hildegarde's version of "Dites-Moi," which helpfully translates the lyrics, something that wasn't done on the Broadway stage. Show music purists may disdain these interpretations, but they helped popularize Rodgers & Hammerstein's work in the 1940s and '50s. ~ William Ruhlmann