Leroy Anderson (Composer & Conductor) - The Leroy Anderson Collection

GREAT Easy Listening with clever orchestrations

Leroy Anderson has a real knack with melodies. You'll find yourself humming or whistling these tunes long after the music has stopped. I recognized my favorites and fell in love with new works. Included are all the "famous" Anderson classics: Sleigh Ride, Fiddle Faddle, Buglers Holiday, The Typewriter song (VERY clever with typewriters being used as instruments), Trumpeters Lullaby and many, many more. A great buy at TWICE the price! September 29, 2008

A Quality Release In Every Respect - Just Not The Originals

In the late 1940s, as the Big Band Sound that dominated the juke boxes, airwaves, and record sales throughout the late 1930s and most of the 1940s began to give way to the rise of the solo vocalist, a new form of orchestra, some heavy on the strings, also appeared on the scene, led by the likes of Mantovani, Nelson Riddle, Hugo Winterhalter and, of course, Leroy Anderson And His "Pops" Concert Orchestra.

His music is eternal, and in this 2-CD set you get virtually everything he put out on disc in that period, including the only four that made it onto the Pop singles charts. The problem is (for collectors of original hits anyway), as a few other reviewers have pointed out, most of the tracks are re-recorded stereo versions, cut in and around 1959. Faithful to the originals almost to the note, they are nevertheless not the ones we heard in the early 1950s.

All this is detailed in the wonderful liner notes under the heading "Catalog of Leroy Anderson Works and His Decca Recordings" which, for every tune included, contains four columns headed "Date Completed" - "Date First performed" - "Date mono Recording" - "Date stereo Recording" compiled in 1988 by Kurt Anderson, who also provides notes on each selection. These follow five full pages of background notes written by Eleanor Anderson and two more pages by Edward Jablonski, co-author of "The Gershwin Years" and author of "Harold Arlen: Happy With The Blues," "The Encyclopedia Of American Music" and "Gershwin." The AAD sound quality is perfect.

For the record, the four that made the charts for Anderson were: The Syncopated Clock, a # 12 in the spring of 1951 b/w The Waltzing Cat on Decca 16005 (the A-side became the theme for TV's "The Late Show"); Blue Tango, a # 1 in December 1951/January 1952 (it spent 5 weeks at the top spot) b/w Belle Of The Ball on Decca 27875; A Christmas Festival, a # 22 for the Christmas 1952 season (a medley arranged by Anderson of Joy To The World/Deck The Halls/God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen/Good King Wenceslas/Hark! The Herald Angels Sing/The First Noel/Silent Night/Jingle Bells/O Come, All Ye Faithful - taking up both sides of Decca 9-16041); and The Typewriter, a # 21 in November 1953 b/w The Girl In Satin on Decca 28881.

It would be nice for collectors to see those original sides presented in one compilation.

June 23, 2008

Fine Stereo Re-recordings

This is a fine collection of Leroy Anderson's music. These are mostly stereo re-recordings, by Leroy Anderson and orchestra. The sound quality of most of them is excellent. The original, familiar recordings of Blue Tango, The Typewriter, etc. do not seem to be the ones included here. Instead, the collection includes later, stereo recordings of the same compositions. I was disappointed by that because, in some cases, the later recordings seem to lack the spirit of the originals. February 25, 2008

Leroy Anderson Collection

Leroy Anderson as great as I remembered him.
What a talent,a composer,an arranger and a conductor of flawless orchestral performance.
Back when films had story lines and writers that could develop story lines,folks like Leroy Anderson added the punch with dramatic accompaniment.
Today overbearing special effects ,no story,no writing and a loud blasting cacophony of electric sounds damages our hearing.
Leroy entertained his audience as the many hit recordings which he sold by the millions attest.
Before and after Rock,Rap and other forgettable noise Leroy Anderson introduces us all to the light classical. Every cut on this CD lives up to my highest expectations. November 13, 2007

Pop Music For Big Band Lovers

No one ever said that Leroy Anderson's music would compete with Mozart. This is music to make you feel good while you are driving, working, or doing something else that allows for mood enhancement. Blue Tango is one of my favorite pieces of pop music. I never fail to smile when I listen to "Plink, Plank, Plunk" simply because the music could not have been named anything else.

If you are culturally acclimated to hard-driving rock and roll you will probably wonder how anyone could listen to this. Same if you are a Rapper. But if you find things to appreciate across the whole breadth of music then Anderson deserves a listen. You will be glad you did. September 27, 2007

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