Exquiste Dinah at her best!

These CD's are some of Dinah Washington at her best. Ella Fitzgerald has a much finer voice, but Dinah resonates with a quiet, unequaled raw power. She manages to sing from real pain and joy and settles in to stay --somewhere deeper than your very bone marrow. In an honored, timeless place all her own, Dinah is Goddess of the Blues and will live, and sing, forever. If you don't own any of her Mercury collections, THIS is the one to buy first. If you already love her music, this one won't disappoint you. You can listen to this collection, and easily imagine that she is probably singing in heaven now to remind the angels of what it means to be human . . . and of the earthly realm.

She was.....She IS.....The Queen

I was just 20 years old in 1963 when I saw the headline that football star Dick "Night Train" Lane's wife had died of a drug overdose. Almost as an after-thought, they added that he had been her 7th husband, she was only 37 years old...and, oh yes, she happened to be a singer named Dinah Washington. Memories......well, I guess that's what The Queen Of The Blues is all about. Memories of the greatest blues singer who ever lived. She had no equal then, she has no equal now. And I also decided a long time ago that if I could only pick one singer to have "piped" into me 6 feet under throughout eternity, Dinah would be the one. If God limited me further, I would pick 2 specific CD's.....Volume 6 and this one, Volume 7, of the "Complete Dinah Washington on Mercury" series.

While 6 contains many more recordings immediately associated with Dinah ('What A Difference a Day Makes,' 'Manhattan,' 'September in the Rain,' 'This Bitter Earth,' 'I Remember You,' and her unforgettable 'Unforgettable') Volume 7 provides just as many classics with enough whimsical nuances or variations in delivery to make each song sound new, even if it's the 800th playing! Special favorites here are 'Without a Song' coupled with 'With a Song in My Heart;' 'Blue Skies;' a revival meeting version of 'Pagan Love Song;' darkly personal renderings of 'Mood Indigo,' 'Mad About the Boy,' 'Am I Blue,' 'In The Wee Small Hours of the Morning;' and the masterpiece of them all, 'Cabin in the Sky.'

You truly need to buy both Volume 6 and 7. It'll be expensive, but send 'em a hundred bucks. You'll get change, plus many more than a hundred hours of the greatest musical pleasure you'll ever experience in this lifetime (or maybe even the next!)

Time Well-Spent with Dinah

Going thru this 3-CD set will keep you glued to your CD player for days, since there's almost 80 songs here, but it's well worth it. The orchestration on this set isn't the most imaginative. Quincy Jones gives Dinah an efficient back-up but the charts aren't written with a lot of creativity. Belford Hendricks is the other arranger here and he drenches Dinah in syrupy strings and violins as well as back-up choruses. But Dinah overcomes the arrangement shortcomings with her remarkable voice, her artistry, her interpretation of the songs---she's just simply remarkable. Dinah revisits some of the songs she first did back in the early 1950s and her re-interpretations of her older versions may first feel awkward, but then you realize her newer versions have a wise, knowing feel to them because this woman has LIVED thru the hard, painful times, and her songs reflect the wisdom gained thru experience. Well worth it, Dinah