The Sinatra collection offers 293 tracks, including 25 unissued items. A few alternates have been substituted for master takes, but the masters probably will be picked up in an album of 60 Sinatra V-Discs due from Columbia in July. As for the 10 Sinatra sides from 1939 with Harry James, which mark the beginning of his career and might have been gathered on a separate "bonus" CD, we can probably expect them later this year under James' name.
The sound is nothing less than a breakthrough. It has a consistent presence and clarity that is extraordinary, from the earliest sides on. Producer Didier Deutsch has wisely avoided mastering from 78s and used 33 1/3 acetate "safties" (and tape after 1951). Note the characteristics of the occasional surface noise, which, bless 'em, they didn't shave off with the rest of the highs. Save for an odd dropout at 30 seconds into "I've Got A Home In That Rock," the sound is flawless. Compare that magnificent sonics here to Columbia's 1986 box collection of Sinatra. Though given the full digital treatment, the sound there was compressed and '40s-ish.
If it's kudos to the producer, though, it's raspberries to the designers. They'll be the death of literacy in this country if anyone will. The dolt here is Tony Sellari, whose often tasteless and annoying layouts for the album booklet insist on overprinting six-point text on faded photos, rendering both, as if by some alchemy of incompetence, into spaghetti. Will Friedwald's important and knowing (except for a mean snipe at Linda Ronstadt on p117) notes are the principle victim of this design cliche, which is good for a star off the rating. All is not lost, though. In a nice touch, label art tracks period designs. And each CD volume reproduces cover art based on the Sinatra albums of the '40s and '50s.
Enduring artists inevitably create their own orthodoxies, which frame everything they do and are difficult to amend. Sinatra launched himself as a purveyor of velveteen romance and longing and hardly stepped out of that role until the end of his Columbia period. The result here is a long, long trail of slow tempos and plush backgrounds by Axel Stordahl that have much in common with the coming Capitols.
It has been the party line to write off the Columbia Sinatras as the work of a skilled but callow youth, an impression Columbia has not seriously contested until now. This set should change that notion. The music whispers to you. You want to lean in an listen. It is exquisitely intimate. Here is the basis of Sinatra's power to draw his audience into a private emotional orbit. Also, more than I had realized, these were the years Sinatra built the core of the repertoire that he would revisit so many times over the rest of his career (e.g., "The Song Is You," "One For My Baby"). We who listen to jazz with sometimes an excess of reverence and partiality are inclined to praise only those singers who reconfigure a song through improvisation, as if anything less is uncreative; as if the song were not enough. This leads us to undervalue those "uncreative" singers who "just" sing. We miss the point of the classical nature of much of the best popular music, where the text is sacred and those who honor it with virtuosity and intelligence, as Sinatra consistently does here, are no less artists for doing so.
Though love songs dominate, there are novelties, too, especially after producer Mitch Miller's ascent at Columbia. The much-discussed but seldom-heard "Mama Will Bark" is here, considered by many the nadir of Sinatra's disc career. But maybe by taking Sinatra on the basis of his own orthodoxy, we deny him license to do the kind of silly material that Bing Crosby could do with ironic nonchalance.
The MCA Crosby set (101 sides, four unissued) is historically more
interesting by far. It traces the evolution of modern pop
singing -- i.e., Crosby -- from its bungalow-style beginnings in the
hotel dance band to the concert-sized castles of strings and french
horns erected for him by Victor Young and John Scott Trotter.
Crosby's voice evolves with uncanny timeliness, from the husky
baritone of the 1931 Brunswicks to the mellow pipe organ that
everyone knowns from "White Christmas" on. The turning point seems to
come around "What's New" late in 1939, reminding us that by the time
Sinatra first recorded with Axel Stordahl in 1942 (for Victor), the
construction was essentially complete and ready to walk into.
Most of the important Crosby work of the period is here, along with a few bits of studio chitchat, a funnu bread own, and a 1943 Rhythm Boys reunion on "Mississippi Mud" that's deliciously p.i. -- politically incorrect. Both the early Brunswick and many of the Deccas bear the mark of Jack Kapp, who produced much Crosby work and kept the crooner on a tight commercial path. (A good survey of his jazz sides is collected on Bing Crosby And Some Jazz Friends.)
Though many regard Sinatra as a child of Crosby, they are unalike in a fundamental way. Sinatra, the volatile, complex, and private one, seemed to draw you into his life when he sang. A poignancy and emotional verisimilitude swirled around him. Crosby, on the other hand, was Mr. what-you-see-is-what-you-get, full of casual, cracker-barrel charm that was friendly and irresistible, especially on duets with Louis Armstrong and Johnny Mercer. And yet, he let no one inside.
Sinatra is enough of an actor so that when his voice slipped, the actor easily picked up the slack. Crosby, who never had to face serious vocal erosion, was the pure musician. Even his talk had rhythm to it. Listen to "Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy." Sinatra never swung a phrase or squeezed a pitch quite like Bing. Some regret that Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald never recorded an album. More to regret is that Ella and Bing didn't. They were natural partners.