Sinatra Swings!

Reprise has remastered roughly 20 of Frank Sinatra's most monumental records from the 50s and 60s. Sinatra's output during the Reprise years consisted of some of the most extraordinary music of his career. One of these remastered CDs is "Swing Along With Me," recorded with Billy May and his Orchestra and orginally released in 1961. Although the record is not quite as stellar as his work with Nelson Riddle, "Swing Along with Me" is marvelous.



The CD gets off to a sublime start with the Rogers and Hart composition "Falling in Love with Love" - the song really does swing and is perhaps the best selection on the CD. Other highlights include "Love Walked In" (Gershwin), "I Never Knew" (Benny Goodman), the breezy "It's a Wonderful World," and the laid-back "You're Nobody `Til Somebody Loves You" (which would become a signature song for Sinatra pal, Dean Martin). "Granada" is also interesting, with a dramatic pseudo-Spanish sound and a "cha cha cha" ending - it was the only song from the record to hit the Top 100 (#64).



In with these gems, though, are a few relative duds. "The Curse of An Aching Heart" is so manic that Sinatra's vocal gets overshadowed at times. "Don't Cry Joe" is more melancholy than swing and sounds out of place here, and "Moonlight on the Ganges" has a fairly cheesy Egyptian intro. In fact, most of the songs are simply not as memorable as the selections from similar Sinatra CDs from the period, such as "Songs For Swingin' Lovers!" or "Come Fly with Me." Of course, those records are indisputable masterpieces. However, overall "Swing Along with Me" is an above average Sinatra CD, which means that it's still pretty exceptional!

Sinatra is swingin' again!

Not as good as previous swingin' albums, but quite alright. Songs are arranged by Billy May.

makin' oopsy

Recorded in 1961 (the days when an in-joke about swinging could still be a sly snap of Sinatra with a mid-swing green putter) this Billy May-conducted orchestra `swing' album is one of ol' Blue Eyes' weakest. In his attempt to cross-over between crotch-stream and mainstream, Sinatra fails on both counts. Not a single tune here is memorable (try singing a single verse from Please Don't Talk About Me). Sinatra knew it. So too did Reprise. The May orchestra tries like hell to carry itself next to the legend, but it fails in it's enthusiasm and in it's lack of subtlety. Ouch! So too does Sinatra. Never in his swinging years (mark the time frame between 1957 and 1965) did he sound so unenthused and robotic in his vocals. Swing Along With Me? He was lucky no one was swinging at him.