Lee Wiley - The RCA Victor Recordings

If you asked me to choose my favorite Lee Wiley records, her various circa 1940 songbooks would be the winners. But these 1956-57 discs would not be far behind.

Today's post includes all the 26 songs she recorded for RCA Victor during those years. The singer was for the most part in prime form; it is regrettable that she made no more records for 15 years thereafter - and those were disappointments.

The Victors include two complete albums and part of another:

• West of the Moon with Ralph Burns, from 1956

• A Touch of the Blues with Billy Butterfield, from 1957

• Two songs from a 1956 jazz miscellany issued under the name of TV host Dave Garroway. (The LP is included in full. It also has contributions from Barbara Carroll, Deane Kincaide, Helen Ward, Tito Puente and Peanuts Hucko.)

I've added a bonus EP, issued to promote a 1963 fictionalized television drama based on incidents in Wiley's life.

All items are from my collection. We'll start with the complete LPs, then circle back to the Garroway collection and the EP. 

West of the Moon

Wiley is in mostly commanding form throughout West of the Moon. She is surprisingly compatible with modernist arranger-conductor Ralph Burns, whose charts support her well - although I can't help but note that she seemed more attuned to the collective improvisations of the groups that backed her on the songbooks.

And in fact, she starts off with a song beloved of those throwback groups - "You're a Sweetheart," which I was intrigued to learn she had not recorded before. To me, Burns' repetitive arrangement is a disappointment, but the vocal is excellent.

Lee moves on unexpectedly to Kurt Weill's "This Is New," where she sounds uncomfortable with the melody line; a shame, it's a magnificent song from the score by Weill and Ira Gershwin for Lady in the Dark.

She's in more compatible territory with the bouncy "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby," a movie song from 1938 by Harry Warren and Johnny Mercer. There are good solos by Billy Butterfield and Peanuts Hucko.

Lee does the highly sophisticated "Who Can I Turn To?" soulfully, an apt tribute to a 1941 piece by Alec Wilder and William Engvick. It is the first song they wrote together.

Burns wrote a lovely chart for Richard Whiting's "My Ideal," and Wiley graces it by including the wonderfully contrasting verse. This would be near perfection except that Lee was not in prime voice.

She is great, however, in "Can't Get Out of This Mood," which Frank Loesser and Jimmy McHugh wrote for Ginny Simms and the 1942 film Seven Days' Leave. But be sure to hear Sarah Vaughan's 1950 Columbia recording.

Ralph Burns and Lee Wiley

"East of the Sun (and West of the Moon)" was the biggest hit for short-lived songwriter Brooks Bowman, who composed it for a Princeton show. Burns' gentle arrangement is just right for this song, which is usually done as a rhythm number.

Lee reached back to the 1920s for the Sammy Fain-Irving Kahal "I Left My Sugar Standing in the Rain," almost never heard these days. She includes the verse, which I'm not sure I've heard otherwise. The song has contrived lyrics, but a memorable melody. The singer is near ideal, and the backing is sympathetic. There's a notable solo by Lou McGarity on trombone.

"Moonstruck" is a high quality song written for Bing to warble in 1933's College Humor, but forgotten these days. It is characteristic Crosby material from the time - but Lee is persuasive as well. The arrangement for the Arthur Johnston-Sam Coslow song is subtly done.

Like "This Is New," "Limehouse Blues" was introduced by Gertrude Lawrence. She performed it with Jack Buchanan in the 1921 West End revue A to Z. It's a fascinating song, although wildly dated, and Burns can't resist including the usual chinoiserie. The song is set up beautifully by the seldom-performed verse.

Wiley and Burns also use the verse to good effect in "As Time Goes By" - again, it leads into the the famous chorus very well.

The LP is rounded off by a return to a Dixieland-type arrangement on Fats Waller-Andy Razaf's perennial "Keepin' Out of Mischief Now," an upbeat end to the proceedings.

The recording captures Wiley's voice truthfully, but the engineers did swaddle the band in too much reverb.

LINK to West of the Moon

A Touch of the Blues

I will admit to preferring the second album, A Touch of the Blues, on all counts - the arrangements by Al Cohn and Bill Finegan, Wiley's singing, the material and the quality of the sound.

Most of the songs are not standards, but are all the more welcome because of it. The first three selections date from as long ago as 1909.

Al Cohn

"The Memphis Blues" is a W.C. Handy song with lyrics by George Norton that is seldom if ever heard these days. Lee and the swinging Al Cohn chart make an strong argument for it.

"From the Land of the Sky-Blue Water" is another case. One of Charles Wakefield Cadman's Indianist works, it's a period piece that should have been left in the period. Wiley was of Native American descent, but the material is not suited to her.

When I first saw the title "The Ace in the Hole," I thought of the Cole Porter song that Mary Jane Walsh introduced in Let's Face It. But this is an earlier piece, and an interesting one at that. James Dempsey and George Mitchell were the authors.

Bill Finegan

Louis Armstrong was the fellow behind "Someday You'll Be Sorry," a good tune not often heard. Bill Finegan's arrangement is entirely supportive. Most enjoyable, with Lee at ease.

"My Melancholy Baby" is certainly well known. Dating back to 1912, it was written by Ernie Burnett and George A. Norton (although Ben Light claimed he was the composer). By the time Wiley recorded it, the piece had become something of a punch line because of its use in the 1954 version of A Star Is Born, where a drunken heckler yells for Judy Garland to "sing Melancholy Baby." (Ex-vaudeville trouper William Frawley - Fred Mertz on I Love Lucy - claimed to have introduced the number. For the curious, his recording has appeared here.) As often on these records, Wiley graces the song by including the verse.

Billy Butterfield

She does not do so, however, for "A Hundred Years from Today," although the composition does have a beautiful introduction by trumpeter Billy Butterfield, who leads the band on the LP. This fine song is the handiwork of Victor Young (Lee's early mentor), Ned Washington and Joe Young.

I really enjoy Benny Carter's "Blues in My Heart," which suits Wiley perfectly. Finegan's sparse arrangement is tailored to the subject matter. Butterfield has a striking obbligato.

"Maybe You'll Be There" is one of Rube Bloom's best songs, with a sensitive lyric by Sammy Gallop. Cohn provides a simple arrangement. The present recording is good, but it will not make you forget Sinatra's recording of the same year, made with Gordon Jenkins.

"Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea," a celebrated number by Arlen and Koehler, is nicely done. This cut is marred by the strangely pinched sound of the muted trumpets.

Frank Loesser and Jule Styne were eminent musicians, but "I Don't Want to Walk Without You" was most effective in its period as a war song. Wiley doesn't seem all that involved.

"Make Believe" is one of the last songs I would have identified with Lee; it's a soaring, quasi-operetta piece that is one of Kern's greatest creations. She does pull it off, but she, Cohn and Butterfield never seem completely happy with the material.

The title song is another matter altogether. "A Touch of the Blues" is a lost gem from Eddie Wilcox, the pianist of the Jimmy Lunceford band, with words by Don George. A good Cohn arrangement, too.

The sound is generally very good, widely spaced early stereo.

LINK to A Touch of the Blues

Dave Garroway Presents the Wide, Wide World of Jazz

The name of this 1956 various artists LP, Dave Garroway Presents the Wide, Wide World of Jazz, was suggested by Garroway being the host of a television show called Wide, Wide World. And the songs do all relate to world locales.

The title is misleading, though, in that it presents a narrow view of jazz, with the exception of Tito Puente's presence. The other artists were from the vocal, Dixieland, swing and piano trio subgenres, and the same musicians play on most of the selections.

Lee Wiley was allotted two of the numbers, both accompanied by Deane Kincaide's Dixieland Band, which also performed two other songs sans vocal.

Deane Kincaide

"Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?", a late example of the longing-for-the-South genre that was so common in the first half of the 20th century, is an excellent song, here in a knowing performance by Wiley and Kincaide's forces. The piece comes from 1946, Louis Alter and Eddie DeLange.

We're back in the South for "Stars Fell on Alabama," a 1934 composition by Mitchell Parish and Frank Perkins. Lee is mostly relaxed and effective, although she strains to hit the highest notes. I do enjoy the arrangement, presumably by Kincaide. The vocalist is at her best in these surroundings, I think.

A few words about the other performers and songs:

Deane Kincaide's Dixieland Band - Kincaide's band has lively outings with Jelly Roll Morton's "Chicago Breakdown" and "Kansas City Stomp." Note that the "Dixieland Band" includes Billy Butterfield, Cutty Cutshall, Peanuts Hucko and Lou Stein, who also are in Hucko's Swing Band, discussed next.

Peanuts Hucko

Peanuts Hucko's Swing Band - I don't mean to imply that Hucko's band is bad - far from it. They have spirited outings with the Gus Kahn-Isham Jones "Spain" and Frank Loesser's "Wonderful Copenhagen" (written for the Danny Kaye film of Hans Christian Anderson). I enjoy this band, and may work up a post devoted to the LP that it recorded with Helen Ward.

Helen Ward

Helen Ward - Hucko's band backs ex-Goodman, James and Hal McIntyre singer Ward on two numbers: Louis Alter's "Manhattan Serenade" and the Gershwins' "A Foggy Day." Ward was a characterful singer whom I enjoy, although her intonation and control here were not impeccable.

Tito Puente

Tito Puente - It's good that Victor included Tito Puente under the jazz rubric, because he did profess to produce "jazz with a Latin touch," had just produced an LP called Puente Goes Jazz, and employed many jazz musicians, including Bernie Glow and Dave Schildkraut on this date. The songs are "Flying Down to Rio" by Youmans and Kahn and arranger Chico O'Farrill's "Havana After Dark."

Barbara Carroll

Barbara Carroll - The fluent pianist and her trio do well with "California, Here I Come" and Carroll's own "Paris Without You." She made several LPs for Victor in this period.

Most of these songs were otherwise unreleased, to my knowledge. "Flying Down to Rio" does appear on Puente's 1957 Night Beat LP, and "A Foggy Day" can also be found on Peanuts Hucko's With a Little Bit of Swing, released in 1958.

The sound is excellent on this LP.

LINK to Dave Garroway Presents the Wide, Wide World of Jazz

Something About Lee Wiley

Events in Wiley's life were the subject of the 1963 television drama Something About Lee Wiley, an episode in the NBC anthology series Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre.

Piper Laurie played Wiley, with Joy Bryan dubbing her singing voice. I haven't seen the show, but it apparently deals with the time Lee fell from a horse and was temporarily blinded, and with her acrimonious marriage to pianist Jess Stacy.

Chrysler put out a promotional EP for the program. Rather than including songs from the episode, it contains two numbers from the West of the Moon LP - "East of the Sun" and "Can't Get Out of This Mood" - contrasted with two of Lee's earliest sides, both made as a band singer with Leo Reisman - "(Got the) South in My Soul" from 1931 and "Time on My Hands" from 1932.

LINK to Something About Lee Wiley

Ray McKinley on RCA Victor, 1947-50

While drummer-singer-bandleader Ray McKinley had a long career, the 1940s were his heyday.  Today we'll look at his longest-lasting band via a selection of 32 recordings he made for RCA Victor from 1947-50.

McKinley (1910-85) became a band musician in his middle teens, joining the Dorsey Brothers at 24. Will Bradley brought him on board in 1939 as a featured artist, labeling his recordings of the time as the "Will Bradley Orchestra Featuring Ray McKinley." Their big hit was "Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar" with a vocal by McKinley, who wrote the piece with Don Raye and Hughie Prince.

McKinley went out on his own in 1942, making records for Hit and Capitol before joining old friend Glenn Miller's Army Air Force Band. After Miller's disappearance in 1944, McKinley co-led the band with arranger Jerry Gray.

McKinley re-started his civilian band in 1946. The group first made records for the small Majestic company, then switched to RCA Victor in 1947.

Saxophonists Deane Kincaide, Billy Ainsworth, Ray Beller, Peanuts Hucko, Pete Terry circa 1947

It was quite a talented ensemble, including at various times Nick Travis, Vern Friley, Ray Beller, Chuck Genduso, Buddy Morrow and Mundell Lowe, among others. Among those handling the charts for McKinley during this period were Deane Kincaide and Eddie Sauter, two notable names among big band arrangers.

One Band, Two Styles LP

About the only collection that RCA reissued from this period was a 1955 LP called One Band, Two Styles, which came out on the budget Camden label. Neither of the two "styles" on the record were entirely characteristic of the McKinley band, worthy though they may be on their own.

Ray McKinley, Eddie Sauter, Deane Kincaide

The first "style" was represented by six compositions by Eddie Sauter recorded at the end of 1947. These surely were earmarked for an album, but it was one that RCA never issued. Only "Idiot's Delight" - one of the more abstruse compositions in the set - was pressed on 78. The rest remained in the vaults until the Camden LP.

Sauter, who made his name with Red Norvo and Benny Goodman, went on to form the Sauter-Finegan Band with Bill Finegan, That band has appeared on this blog a number of times.

 

The second "style" on the Camden LP encompassed a reissue of the 1950 set Ray McKinley Plays Rodgers and Hart for Dancing. This was one of 15 albums that RCA issued simultaneously in an attempt to hypo the band business, which had hit the post-war doldrums. RCA's promotional campaign was called "Here Come the Dance Bands Again," even though the release encompassed everyone from Spade Cooley to Miguelito Valdes. The record company labelled the records as being "Designed for Dancing" - certainly a contrast to the Sauter compositions, which for many listeners might have been designed for head-scratching.

There are two vocals among the Rodgers and Hart songs, one by McKinley, the other by the excellent Dale Nunnally. The Sauter materials are entirely instrumental.

Dale Nunnally

1947-50 Singles

As noted, neither side of the Two Sides LP was characteristic of the McKinley band of the period - at least of its recorded repertoire. To give you a better idea of how the band sounded on record and presumably in its live appearances, I've put together 20 songs derived from RCA Victor singles of the period.

The first thing you may notice is that while only two of the 12 songs on the LP have vocals, 17 of the 20 singles do. Most of the vocal chores are handled by McKinley himself, who often abandoned the drum kit to step out in front of the ensemble. He was an engaging entertainer - I've linked before to a band short from 1946 in which he sings "Hoodle Addle" and introduces the band, including Beller, Friley and Lowe. The "Hoodle Addle" arrangement was by a decidedly more relaxed Eddie Sauter, who even throws in a few "hey baba-re-bop" licks into the mix.

McKinley was always more of a performer than a crooner. He has very little range and doesn't change his approach much from song to song.

Jean Friley

Heard on two vocals are Marcy Lutes, who a decade later made a well-regarded LP for Decca, then essentially disappeared from the scene. She was succeeded by Jean Friley, who is good but gets little chance to shine. The final vocalist was the previously mentioned Dale Nunnally.

Most of the arrangements are unattributed, although Kincaide does get two label credits, being billed as Deane "Look, Ma, No Zither" Kincaide on "The 3rd Man Theme." Much of the repertoire consists of the usual pop songs from the time - "Put 'Em in a Box," "Sunflower," "Little Jack Frost Get Lost" and so on. "The Irish Washerwoman" makes an appearance as "Boogie Woogie Washerwoman."

The sound on all 32 sides is quite good. The One Band, Two Sides LP was drawn from my collection. I remastered the 78s from lossless needle drops found on Internet archive. The download includes label scans, more photos, etc.

McKinley folded his band in 1950, then became a part-time bandleader until the Glenn Miller revival took hold following the release of The Glenn Miller Story in 1954. In 1956 Miller's widow asked him to organize a new band under Miller’s name using the original library and style. McKinley led that band for a decade, making quite a few LPs for RCA Victor.

Note (August 2024): these recordings have been remastered in ambient stereo.

LINK