Here by request is George Siravo's circa 1956 LP, Portraits in Hi-Fi. Siravo's records have shown themselves to be quite popular hereabouts, much to my surprise.
This album comprises Siravo compositions, and for some reason he ventures into what I would have to assume is deliberately trite material on several cuts. Not sure what the point of that is.
Nor can I tell you what is supposed to be happening on the cover. The unspoken assumption seems to be that all women are housewives, and they are getting dressed up for a portrait. But what of the man? If he is a painter, is he supposed to be Siravo himself? And if so, why is his coat four sizes too large and his hair and beard so odd?
Enough of this pointless musing (I hear you saying) - on to the sounds. I have to tell you, then as now, when you speak the words "hi-fi" to an engineer, he eagerly plugs in the reverb unit. So here, Siravo's music is bathed in an echo that only Mantovani could love.
However, I will say the LP was in excellent shape. and admit that I enjoyed the music a great deal - there is much here to like. I just wish someone had hidden the reverb machine. (Also the xylophone.)
16 comments:
Bumps-A-Daisy? Oh my, I haven't heard that since I was a little kid!
Thanks so much for sharing this George Siravo album.
what a treat! More Siravo is always welcome. I have a few Siravo LP's in my collection, but they are more of the 1001 strings variety... very sedate stuff.
Oops, I was confusing it with Hands, Knees and Boomps-A-Daisy - a completely different kettle of fish!
I'm listening now, and I agree with Scoredaddy that it's a real treat.
Saw something interesting on the back cover - mention of an LP by the Conley Graves Trio. His LPs are as rare as hens' teeth. I wish I could get my hands on his album Genius At Work...
@ Mel,
I know I don't have that Conley Graves LP, but I am sure I have seen it, so I will be on the lookout.
Wow, I'm a sucker for this one.
Great one!
Buster,
I have gladly taken many road trips with you, but this is one time I regret allowing you to have been my chauffeur. George Siravo, who wasn't a half-bad arranger wasn't a half-good composer. This album is embarrassingly bad--especially after recent postings of Victor Young and Gordon Jenkins. Sorry. A hack is a hack and hack music is hack music. There was no reason for this record then--and now.
Thanks for fulfilling my request Buster. You're a true blue friend. What an incredible clean copy too! Let me know if you're looking for anything. Maybe I have it.
Well, we certainly have a range of opinion on this one. I called the compositions trite - but many of you disagree. And David couldn't abide them!
Dear Buster!
Can you reupload this album?
Thank you for these blogs!
Remastered version (Apple lossless):
https://mega.nz/#!adECADjY!StoR-62MFW7M3hdPBLI5-ZBP8QOQmI1QGbb8FgnAYQc
Thank you very much!
grabbing remastered version! thanks
According to The Decca Labels: A Discography by Michel Ruppli, this LP comes from three sessions held in three different years:
New York, 30 September 1953
85280 Secret Sorrow
85281 Hey! Taxi
85282 Tango Martinique
85283 Palsy Walsy
New York, 9 March 1954
86051 Hop Scotch
86052 Deep Shadows
86053 Showin' Off
86054 That Goodnight Kiss
New York, 24 May 1956
100003 In Old Madrid
100004 Bumps-A-Daisy
100005 Christine
100006 Whistler's March
"Palsy Walsy"/"Secret Sorrow" were released as a single in November 1953 (Decca 28906), "Showin' Off"/"That Goodnight Kiss" in June 1954 (Decca 29139) and "Bumps-A-Daisy"/"In Old Madrid" in July 1956 (Decca 30012), but the other six tracks were unreleased until the LP came out rather belatedly in December 1957.
I have to take serious issue with the hostility expressed towards this record. Thanks to the blogs such as this one, in the past six months or so I've heard at least fifty orchestral-instrumental LPs from the 1950s and 1960s that were new to me. And in terms of pleasant aftertaste, this stands out as one of the two or three best among those. I can only shake my head in disbelief when this is described as "embarrassingly bad" and "hack music". It made my day, and I'm looking forward to its making several more!!!
(And as for "reverb unit" – there is no reverb whatsoever on this record, only the completely natural room ambience from Decca's spacious Pythian Temple studio at 135 West 70th Street in Manhattan, where most of their East Coast sessions were held in the 1950s. You will hear this same non-existent "reverb" on any Decca record ever made there; Bill Haley, Al Hibbler, the Weavers, Mills Brothers, Teresa Brewer, Buddy Holly, you name it.)
Boursin - Thanks for the information! Most welcome. I don't know what others may have said about this record, but I do still believe that some of the compositions are trite and that there is too much reverb on the LP, natural or not.
Oh, I actually agree that some of the compositions are trite. But the ones that aren't, more than make up for that! Thanks again.
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