States Medley/Happy Tramps Medley/Widdicombe Fair/Your Requests/Cheep Cheep (Birdies) Medley/Down Memory Lane/The Frog & The Mouse/Long Long Ago Medley
Not a live recording but a representation of the kinds of songs they performed in their stage show. On Stage was the final UK album chart topper from the now reviled Black & White Minstrels. (UK:1)
“One’s primary astonishment is how The Minstrels managed to survive and indeed thrive in the mainstream of entertainment for so long. In the last album chart of 1962, three of the top five slots were occupied by Minstrels music.”
“Tony Mercer croons Georgia as though Ray Charles had never happened. Readings of Stars Fell On Alabama and Where Or When compared with Sinatra’s illustrate a difference between death and life. And everywhere there lurk these perfect Home Counties vowels, unchanging whether they be in 'Kentucky sure as you’re born' or on the 'bonnie banks of the Clyde'.”
“Some songs, for instance, The Lady Is A Tramp and You Are My Sunshine are more or less entirely obscured by unnecessary contrapuntal devices, but then show tunes appeared to be the only 'recent' music with which The Minstrels seemed to be comfortable. It is virtually superfluous to say that their Sunshine perishes instantly when set next to the definitive George Russell/Sheila Jordan recasting of the same song recorded in the same year. But when The Minstrels strive to 'go modern' the results are merely embarrassing.”
“Though many of record buying demographic elected to change their allegiances in 1963, the show continued both on TV and on stage for a further fifteen or so years. Even though the TV show’s final cancellation was ascribed to political pressure, the truth was that it had been losing ratings for some while and was proving prohibitively expensive to produce. But then it disappeared completely, wiped from the collective slate.”
“This is a great collection of familiar songs. I spend the early 60s in London and loved the TV show where these songs were performed.”
No comments:
Post a Comment