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| Various Artists |
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| This survey of torch-carrying vocal tracks features such legends as Ella Fitzgerald, Etta James, Sarah Vaughan and others, plus recent stars Diana Krall and Norah Jones. |
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| 1 The Man I Love - James, Etta |
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| 2 I Fall in Love Too Easily - Vaughan, Sarah |
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| 3 Body and Soul - Krall, Diana |
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| 4 I Wanna Be Around - Lee, Peggy |
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| 5 My One and Only Love - Christy, June |
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| 6 The Nearness of You - Jones, Norah |
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| 7 Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye - Fitzgerald, Ella |
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| 8 All the Way - Smith, Keely |
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| 9 Darn That Dream - Reeves, Dianne |
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| 10 Good Morning Heartache - Clooney, Rosemary |
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| 11 More Than You Know - Starr, Kay |
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| 12 Angel Eyes - ODay, Anita |
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| 13 These Foolish Things - Washington, Dinah |
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| 14 In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning - London, Julie |
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| 15 Blues in the Night - London, Julie |
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| 16 The Very Thought of You - James, Etta |
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| 17 Love Is Here to Stay - Shore, Dinah |
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| 18 Love for Sale - Bregman, Buddy & Orchestra |
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| 19 East of the Sun (And West of the Moon) - Smith, Keely |
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| 20 Misty - Staton, Dakota |
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| 21 Fly Me to the Moon - Washington, Dinah |
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| 22 I've Grown Accustomed to His Face - Starr, Kay |
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| 23 I Left My Heart in San Francisco - Wilson, Nancy [1] |
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| 24 Oh! You Crazy Moon - Lee, Peggy |
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| 25 In a Sentimental Mood - Vaughan, Sarah |
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Album Review
Capitol holds in its vault many of the definitive torch songs in recorded history, and has issued them many times in many forms. "Torch Songs", a two-disc standards collection released in 2004, unfortunately and rather surprisingly, doesn't include many of the best. It does, however, illustrate that the label has some distance to travel before exhausting its supply of excellent material. It also doesn't plumb the depths of lovelorn depression quite like Capitol's previous torch collection, 2003's "Lady Sings the Blues" (also a double disc with many of the same singers), but it's a more engaging collection for it. On most of these performances, the person whom the singer is torching for is simply absent, not fled (so to be pedantic, they're ballads rather than torch songs). Semantics aside, the performers are all genre-defining and the songs are strong as well, evidenced by Dinah Washington's "These Foolish Things," Etta James' "The Very Thought Of You," Norah Jones' "The Nearness Of You," and Peggy Lee's "I Wanna Be Around." Ella Fitzgerald, licensed from Verve especially for this collection, cries her heart-rending performance of "Ev'Ry Time We Say Goodbye," and delivers one of the most pleasurable moments in popular song with her masterful switch in key on Cole Porter's line "How strange the change, from major to minor." "Torch Songs" does include plenty of true heartache, most of them ironically delivered by stronger vocalists such as Anita O'Day ("Angel Eyes"), Rosemary Clooney ("Good Morning Heartache"), and Fitzgerald again ("Love For Sale"). Even singers of the second rank are represented with excellent songs -- Nancy Wilson, Dakota Staton, Dianne Reeves, and Kay Starr, the latter one of Capitol's most underrated jazz singers. ~ John Bush, All Music Guide
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