My Kind Of Broadway – FRANK SINATRA****

Everybody Has The Right To Be Wrong/Golden Moment/Luck Be A Lady/Lost In The Stars/Hello Dolly/I’ll Only Miss Her When I Think Of Her/They Can’t Take That Away/Yesterdays/Nice Work If You Can Get It/Have You Met Miss Jones/Without A Song

Frank Sinatra's My Kind Of Broadway is a collection of songs from several musicals, pieced together from various recording sessions over the previous four years. (US:30)

"It features songs from nine arrangers and composers, the most ever on a single Sinatra album."

"Pieced together from a variety of sessions and soundtracks, My Kind Of Broadway is an uneven record, featuring a handful of gems among a bunch of competent, but undistinguished performances. Most of the songs are classics, but the arrangements and performances frequently are nothing more than competent. When Sinatra delivers, as he does on the show-stopper Luck Be A Lady the results are pretty spectacular, but the majority of the album is merely pleasant."

"One of the things that made Frank Sinatra legendary was the way he would put out thematic albums, often of saloon songs or swing numbers, that had a sense of unity that raised the bar for our expectations in that regard. But My Kind Of Broadway, despite having nothing but Broadway songs, does not possess that same sort of thematic unity."

"Too bad Sinatra never went into the studio with the specific aim of making a Broadway album, but in the 1960s he was mostly covering contemporary pop songs."

"At the time these were in many cases new arrangements of old songs and new songs not previously released. Sinatra is also backed up by various orchestras. All in all I enjoy this album and I have been playing it regularly."

"This is my favourite Sinatra album, of dozens I'm fortunate enough to own. Except for Hello Dolly which is out of place here, it comprises an adventuresome cross section of Broadway tunes."