Tony Bennett - Hometown, My Town (1959) - VINYL, 6eye STEREO - 24-bit/96kHz plus CD-compatible format

This LP is unreleased on CD - found a nice copy.

Most of my Tony Bennett efforts are in digitizing his mono LP's, but I found this in such great shape, I could not resist. This LP is unreleased on CD



Review by Nick Dedina
One of the best albums that Tony Bennett cut in the '50s, Hometown, My Hometown is a song suite dedicated to the vocalist's beloved New York City. The album was in part influenced by Gordon Jenkins' highly successful Manhattan Tower album which was a big seller throughout the '50s. But unlike it and so many other similar theme albums (such as Sinatra's Come Fly with Me or Mel Tormé's Songs of New York), Bennett doesn't sing songs that are specifically about geographical places in Manhattan or even about the city in general. Instead, the tunes are ones that Bennett feels best evoke the city and the unique solitude that one experiences on Manhattan's crowded streets. Noted jazz arranger Ralph Burns is the perfect choice to flesh out and connect the numbers. He also gamely pens extended musical passages that evoke Manhattan even when the lyrics do not. Judged only on his sweeping, highly jazz-inflected arrangements here it's not surprising that Burns would go on to win both Tonys and Oscars for his work in theater and film. Thematically, the album tells a story of a lonely urbanite who finds fleeting happiness with a girl and then loses her. It's as simple as that. But while the lyrics to the final track – the standard "The Party's Over" – may be construed as negative, Bennett puts a positive spin on the song, giving the sense that in a town like Manhattan the next chapter of the story is just around the corner. One of the heavily jazz accented albums that Bennett was able to cut between all of his orchestral ballad sessions, Hometown, My Hometown is shorter than most albums of the '50s. Perhaps this is why this excellent work has been out of print for so long.





+* - 01 - The Skyscraper Blues.flac
- 02 - Penthouse Serenade (When We're Alone).flac
+* - 03 - All By Myself.flac
* - 04 - I Cover The Waterfront.flac
+* - 05 - Love Is Here To Stay.flac
* - 06 - The Party's Over.flac

+ = only LP appearance
* = unreleased on CD

The tracks were recorded just prior to the studio tracks for "In Person! with Count Basie".

Session info (used with permission from http://www.steve-albin.com/Artists/Bennett/index.html):
Date: November 3, 1958
Location: 30th Street, New York
Tony Bennett (ldr), Ralph Burns (con, a), Ed Caine, Walt Levinsky, J. Palmer, Romeo Penque (r), Danny Bank (bar), Al De Risi, Bernie Glow, Marky Markowitz, Carl Poole (t), Billy Byers, Urbie Green, Chauncey Welsch (tb), Al Caiola (g), Pat Merola (b), Ralph Sharon (p), Janet Putman (hrp), Seymour Barab, Burt Fisch, Howard Kay, Harvey Shapiro, Alan Shulman, Isadore Zirr (vc, vl), Terry Snyder (d), Don Lamond (per), Arnold Eidus, Julius Held, Max Hollander, Leo Kruczek, Tosha Samoroff, H. Urbont, Maurice Wilk, Paul Winter (vn), Tony Bennett (v)
a. CO 61704 Skyscraper Blues - 6:50 (Unknown)
b. CO 61705 By Myself (Arthur Schwartz, Harold Dietz)
Both titles on: Columbia LP 12": CL 1301 — Hometown, My Town (1959)

Date: November 4, 1958
Location: 30th Street, New York
Tony Bennett (ldr), Ralph Burns (con, a), Ed Caine, J. Palmer, Romeo Penque (r), Toots Mondello (as, cl), Al Cohn (ts), Danny Bank (bar), Al De Risi, Marky Markowitz, James Maxwell, Carl Poole (t), Billy Byers, William Elton, Chauncey Welsch (tb), Barry Galbraith (g), Milt Hinton (b), Ralph Sharon (p), Janet Putman (hrp), Seymour Barab, Harold Colletta, Burt Fisch, George Ricci, Lucien Schmidt, Isadore Zirr (vc, vl), Don Lamond (d), Eddie Costa (per), Harry Edison, Julius Held, Leo Kruczek, Harry Lookofsky, Tosha Samoroff, Sol Shapiro, Maurice Wilk, Paul Winter (vn), Tony Bennett (v), Robert Abernathy, Ranier C. De Intinis, Joseph Singer (oth)
a. CO 61706 The Party's Over (Betty Comden, Adolph Green, Jule Styne)
Columbia LP 12": CL 1763 — Mr. Broadway: Tony's Greatest Broadway Hits (1962)
Columbia LP 12": C 32239 — Sunrise, Sunset (1973)
b. CO 61707 I Cover The Waterfront (Johnny Green, Edward Heyman)
Columbia LP 12": CS 9891 — Love Story: 20 All-Time Great Recordings (1969)
c. CO 61708 Our Love Is Here To Stay (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin)
All titles on: Columbia LP 12": CL 1301 — Hometown, My Town (1959)

Date: November 6, 1958
Location: 30th Street, New York
Tony Bennett (ldr), Ralph Burns (con, a), Ed Caine, A. Epstein, J. Palmer, Romeo Penque (r), Toots Mondello (as, cl), Al De Risi, Bernie Glow, Marky Markowitz, James Maxwell (t), Billy Byers, William Elton, Urbie Green (tb), Barry Galbraith (g), Pat Merola (b), Ralph Sharon (p), Janet Putman (hrp), Seymour Barab, Harold Colletta, Burt Fisch, George Ricci, Alan Shulman, Isadore Zirr (vc, vl), Don Lamond (d), Eddie Costa (per), Fred Buldrini, Julius Held, Max Hollander, Leo Kruczek, David Nadien, Tosha Samoroff, Maurice Wilk, Paul Winter (vn), Tony Bennett (v), Robert Abernathy, Ray Alonge, Richard L. Berg (oth)
a. CO 61709 Penthouse Seranade (Will Jason, Val Burton)
Columbia LP 12": CL 1301 — Hometown, My Town (1959)
Columbia LP 12": CS 9891 — Love Story: 20 All-Time Great Recordings (1969)
Columbia CD: C4K 46843 — Forty Years - The Artistry Of Tony Bennett (1991)
Columbia Legacy CD: 92784 — Fifty Years: The Artistry of Tony Bennett (2004)
b. CO 61710 Skyscraper Blues (Unknown)
c. CO 61736 Our Love Is Here To Stay (George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin)




No music was harmed in the making of this vinyl rip.