Matt Dennis and Virginia Maxey

Singer-pianist-composer Matt Dennis is a firm favorite on this blog, via his MacGregor transcriptions and his complete Capitol output. Here's another unusual item - actually four of them, taken from The Navy Swings series of 15-minute shows sent for promotional purposes to radio stations.

In these, Matt is joined by his wife, the well-known former band singer Virginia Maxey. The programs are from about 1963 or 1964, which is when the couple began performing in nightclubs as Matt and Ginny Dennis.

The four shows are on two LPs, and contain 16 songs in total. These probably reflect their act, being split among solo features and duets. The performances are extroverted, which also likely reflects their nightclub performances. The loud number "Oom-Pah-Pah," from Lionel Bart's Oliver!, is made for live performance and doesn't work very well on a record. (Oliver! opened on Broadway in 1963, one of the reasons why I've dated the records for that year or soon after.)

George Fenneman

The Navy programs intersperse musical numbers with the usual scripted banter, here slightly better than usual because of the announcer, George Fenneman, who had become famous as Groucho Marx's unflappable straight man on the TV show You Bet Your Life. Each program also contains two recruiting spots, which on these shows promote the Airborne Officer Candidate program.

Matt's songs include:

"Show Me the Way to Get Out of This World ('Cause That's Where Everything Is)," which he wrote with Les Clark and recorded for RCA Victor in 1955.

"By the Bend of the River," a 1927 song that Matt may have picked up from the recent LP versions from Betty Carter and Etta Jones. He doesn't seem to have recorded it otherwise.

"Everything Happens to Me," one of his most famous songs, written with Tom Adair in 1940 and introduced by Sinatra with Tommy Dorsey. It's also on Dennis' 1954 Trend LP, and on a MacGregor transcription that can be found here.

"The Lorelei," an instrumental written by Barclay Allen, former Freddy Martin pianist who was paralyzed in a 1949 car crash.

"Why Try to Change Me Now" by Cy Coleman and Joseph McCarthy, which was introduced in 1952 by Sinatra. An interesting choice by Dennis - this song strikes me as being strongly influenced both musically and lyrically by "Everything Happens to Me."

"Have You Met Miss Jones?" from 1937's I'd Rather Be Right. This is also on Dennis' 1954 RCA Victor LP She Dances Overhead, his Rodgers and Hart LP.

"Love Is Wonderful Everywhere," a Dennis song that was not otherwise recorded, as far as I can tell.

Ginny's selections are:

"Time After Time" by Cahn and Styne, written for Sinatra's 1947 MGM film It Happened in Brooklyn.

"Come Fly with Me," a Sammy Cahn-Jimmy Van Heusen song from one of Sinatra's most popular albums.

"The More I See You" by Harry Warren and Mack Gordon for the 1945 film Diamond Horseshoe, where Dick Haymes introduced it.

"Just in Time," a Jule Styne song from Bells Are Ringing, written in 1958 with Comden and Green, and sung by Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin in the show.

"On the Street Where You Live," Lerner and Loewe's great number from My Fair Lady.

Young Ginny and Matt

The Ginny-Matt duets are:

"We Belong Together," a 1954 song by Dennis and Don Lodice, which also can be found on Matt's 1954 Trend LP.

"Oom-Pa-Pa," the Lionel Bart song from Oliver! introduced by Georgia Brown in the 1960 West End production.

"The Night We Called It a Day," another classic Dennis-Adair song that was Sinatra's first solo single. It's on Matt's 1954 album on Trend; also on a MacGregor transcription that can be found here.

Matt is in excellent form throughout; Ginny too except for a tendency to get shouty on the high notes. As a band singer, I imagine she was used to projecting her voice. The backing combo is proficient, although I could do without the trumpet obbligatos. 

As always, I've tracked the LPs so that you can listen once (if that) to the banter and Navy spots, then jettison them in favor of the songs. The sound is very good, although the dynamics are compressed for AM radio use. The download includes a New York Times review of Matt and Ginny's act from early 1964.

More on the Matt Dennis Transcriptions

My friend and occasional collaborator John Morris has come up with a discography of Matt Dennis' MacGregor transcriptions. This allows me to shed some light on the recording dates (years, at least) for the various songs in my recent post, and provides information on other recordings that have yet to come to light.

Here is a listing of all Dennis' transcriptions. The items included in my post are in blue boldface. Note that as I speculated, these recordings all date from the 1940s. "Angel Eyes" was recorded in 1946, soon after it was written.

1945

Matt Dennis/Eddie Skrivanek: Will You Still Be Mine/ Everything Happens to Me/ Let's Get Away From It All/ The Night We Called It a Day

1946

Matt Dennis: Angel Eyes/ Hitch Up the Sleigh/ Tonight Is Ours/ Natch/ I Haven't the Heart

October 1947

Matt Dennis: Lazy Countryside/ A Fellow Needs a Girl/ Saturday Date/ White Christmas/ I Still Get Jealous

November 1947

Matt Dennis: Rock Me to Sleep/ True/ Penthouse Serenade (When We're Alone)/ They Can't Take that Away from Me/ Can't We Be Friends?

January 1948

Matt Dennis: You Brought a New Kind of Love to Me/ Street of Dreams/ Easy to Love/ Things that Couldn't Happen/ Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

April 1948 (?)

Matt Dennis Trio: Sheik of Araby/ Little Kiss Each Morning/ On Revival Day/ I Only Have Eyes for You/ ’Way Down Yonder in New Orleans

Matt Dennis Trio: Riders in the Sky/ Don't Blame Me/ By the Bend of the River/ I'm Through with Love/ Sometimes I'm Happy.

Note: Birth of the Blues and Yes Sir, That's My Baby with Eddie Skrivanek's Sextette from Hunger apparently come from commercial issues, presumably from the same period.

The Matt Dennis Transcriptions, Plus a Bonus

Nearly a decade ago, I posted a set of 12 transcriptions that singer-songwriter-pianist Matt Dennis made for the C.P. MacGregor company circa 1947. They were derived from a Tops budget LP from the 1950s.

Today I am revisiting those 12 songs and adding 11 more from the same source. Nine of the new items came from a Glendale LP from the 1970s; two are from a MacGregor 78 that I cleaned up from a lossless post on the Internet Archive.

As I wrote on the occasion of another Dennis post (a compilation of his six Capitol singles), "These days, Matt Dennis is mostly known for his compositions - 'Angel Eyes,' 'Violets for Your Furs,' 'The Night We Called It a Day,' 'Everything Happens to Me,' all available in superb Sinatra renditions - but he also was one of the finest singers of the post-war era."

For today's post, in addition to this augmented Dennis collection, we have a new compilation from David Federman, "It's a Great Life If You Don't Weaken." More about both sets below.

The Matt Dennis Transcriptions

Dennis had the good fortune of working with the Tommy Dorsey band relatively early in his career. A young singer named Sinatra also was in residence there, and it so happened that Dennis' songs were perfectly suited to The Voice. For Frank, Dennis wrote "Everything Happens to Me," "Violets for Your Furs," "Let's Get Away from It All," "In the Blue of Evening" and "There's No You." Meanwhile, Connie Haines had a hit with his "Will You Still Be Mine."

Matt Dennis

This successful interlude was interrupted by World War II and the armed services. At the end of the war, Dennis became a single act. His first recordings - dating from mid-1946 to mid-1947 - were with Paul Weston for the Capitol label, as noted above.

At about the same time, Dennis recorded at least 23 songs for MacGregor transcriptions, one of the outfits that supplied recorded music to radio stations. I haven't been able to find a MacGregor discography, so I don't know exactly how many songs Dennis did for them.

Whatever the total, I suspect all the recordings date from about 1947. In this collection, two of the songs were introduced in that year: "A Fellow Needs a Girl" from Rodgers and Hammerstein's show Allegro and "Lazy Countryside" from Disney's film Fun and Fancy Free. Author Will Friedwald has speculates that some of the recordings may come from the 1950s, because Dennis' "Angel Eyes" wasn't introduced until the 1953 film Jennifer. However, the song was actually written in 1946 or 1947 (sources differ), so I believe the MacGregor version included here comes from that period.

Beside "Angel Eyes," this transcription collection includes Dennis' "Everything Happens to Me" and "The Night We Called It a Day," among the songs previously mentioned. Also from his pen are "Natch," "Tonight Is Ours" and the excellent seasonal composition "Hitch Up the Sleigh."

Dennis wrote "Tonight Is Ours" with Eddie Skrivanek, whom  Friedwald identifies as a MacGregor bandleader. Presumably Skrivanek conducts the orchestra that is heard on a few cuts. He also was responsible for the final two songs, "Birth of the Blues" and "Yes Sir, That's My Baby," interpreted by his "Sextette from Hunger" Dixieland ensemble with vocals by Dennis.

Dennis performs the other songs solo or with a rhythm section. The sound on these sides is at least serviceable. The best are the Sextette recordings, which came directly from the 78 transcriptions. The worst are a few songs from the Tops LP that have had reverb added.

The Sextette from Hunger, Skrivanek at center

Bonus: 'It's a Great Life If You Don't Weaken'

David Federman's latest compilation takes its title from a 1930 George Olsen record, one of the 32 in this set. Included are many of my favorite artists - Duke Ellington, Sue Raney, Mildred Bailey, Jack Teagarden, Jackie Paris, Buddy Clark, Chet Baker among them.

David writes, "This is an unapologetic exercise in optimism that celebrates the merriment to be found in the monastic lives we've been forced to live the last 15 months and may resume if deviant Covid strains start counterpunching the vaccines we've developed to fight them. In short, the purpose of this 32-song mix is to savor the moment and various forms of relief for doing so." And that it does very well.

Remastered and Reupped, Vol. 2 - featuring Matt Dennis

Here is a second selection of recordings that I have remastered and reuploaded. These have far superior sound in all cases.

First of all, I want to showcase my redo of the nine singles that singer Matt Dennis made for Capitol in 1946 and possibly early 1947, all with Paul Weston. These are excellent records - Dennis was a terrific singer even relatively early in his career, the arrangements were fine, and the songs were well selected, although I could do without "A Trout, No Doubt." (Hey, that rhymes!) He even makes me like "Linda."

As mentioned, I have remastered these sides and the sound is much improved. I also have carefully repitched the recordings, which were sharp, making Dennis sound adolescent (he was 32). The transfers are from my collection of 78s.

These days, Dennis is mostly known for his compositions - "Angel Eyes," "Violets for Your Furs," "The Night We Called It a Day," "Everything Happens to Me," all available in superb Sinatra renditions - but he also was one of the finest singers of the post-war era. Unfortunately, none of the songs here are his compositions.

The rest of today's remastered selections:

Virgil Thomson - The River; Otto Luening - Prelude on a Hymn Tune by William Billings; Two Symphonic Interludes. ARS recordings led by Dean Dixon.

Written on the Wind; Rhapsody for Four Girls in Town. Soundtrack recordings of music by Frank Skinner and Alex North. The latter piece features Andre Previn on piano.

Nielsen - Symphony No. 3. The classic rendition led by Erik Tuxen.

Jo Stafford and Gordon MacRae - Sunday Evening Songs. Really old oldies in treasurable versions from the beloved pair.

See the original posts for more on these selections. Links to the downloads are in the comments.

Night Out Music for Stay-At-Homes

I transferred this circa 1956 LP for the Matt Dennis songs it contains, but I thought some of you might enjoy the complete contents, which feature a number of other pianists.

First, about the three Dennis songs. "Black Lace" and "Just a Girl That Men Forget" were coupled on a Coral single in 1950 or 51. As far as I can tell, "The Lonesomest Whistle" is otherwise unissued. I believe these were the only recordings the singer-pianist made for Coral.

I don't have access to my Dennis LPs at the moment, but I think he may have recorded "Just a Girl That Men Forget" for another label. Seems hardly worth recording once.

The LP starts off with two songs that Nat Cole recorded for Decca very early in his career, with guitarist Oscar Moore and bassist Wesley Prince. "Sweet Lorraine" - a classic - comes from December 1940, and "Slow Down" is from March 1941. The latter was written by singer-songwriter-publisher Redd Evans, a friend of Cole's. (Evans has appeared as singer on my other blog.) This transfer seemed to be about a half-step flat, so I've adjusted it accordingly.

The three sides by Erroll Garner are among the four he recorded for Signature in March 1945. I am not an admirer of Garner's pianism, so have little to say about these records, except that "Loot to Boot" appears to be based on "Nola" - at least Garner quotes the earlier tune.

Pianist Billy Taylor also makes an appearance with two standards: "My Heart Stood Still" is from January 1950; "Darn That Dream" could be from the same session. They first came out on a Coral single, and are pleasant.

Finally, there is pianist, later composer and sometime singer Cy Coleman, a favorite of mine. He recorded these two songs circa 1950, when he was just 21. The transfers of "Sabia" and "Caprice" seemed to be very sharp, so I have taken them down a full step.

The more records I work on, the more I realize that record companies often mucked with the speed of their transfers, for whatever reason. I have compensated for this phenomenon on many occasions, and have been taken to task (sometimes rudely) by commenters for missing other off-speed recordings. My collection contains one recording so out of kilter that I can't even produce an acceptable transfer. So this LP is by no means an anomaly for the period.

The recorded sound is variable, and my pressing had a few issues, hopefully not too distracting.

The cover is characteristic of the time, when the proportion of men smoking pipes and women in negligees was far higher on record covers than it was anywhere else, other than Hugh Hefner's publications.

More Matt Dennis

I had a request for this Matt Dennis LP, which I am particularly happy to provide at this time because it contains two seasonal songs.

This is a selection of radio transcriptions that the singer-songwriter made primarily (I believe) in 1947, although this Tops LP dates from about a decade later. These were done for the C.P. MacGregor company, which was one of the major houses providing transcription services to radio stations.

Matt Dennis

I say 1947 because some of the songs date from then, including Dennis' own "Natch," a Merceresque tune that I would swear Mercer himself recorded, although I can't find any evidence of such.

Almost all of these recordings are of Dennis alone with his piano, which is the best way to hear him. The holiday selections are Matt's fine composition "Hitch Up the Sleigh" and an affecting version of "White Christmas."

Matt Dennis is strong favorite of mine, so I hope you will try this excellent record

More on Matt Dennis

There was quite a bit of interest in the Matt Dennis Capitol 78s that I posted below, so I did a bit more research on them in Billboard magazine.

Dennis was with Capitol for a year - from mid-1946 to mid-1947, leaving that company in a dispute over contract terms. I was not able to turn up any mention of Capitol recordings other than the ones in the post below, so they may be the extent of his Capitol output.

I enjoy preparing posts of 78s, but they pose a couple of challenges. They are time consuming to transfer, which prevents me from working on other projects. And my 78 (and 45) collection is almost completely unorganized, meaning that assembling what I need for a particular post can turn into a search and (sometimes, considering the fragility of the source material) destroy mission.

It took me quite some time, for example, to put together a group of Jackie Paris singles for my next collection. Every time I came across one, I put it aside until I had gathered enough for a respectable post. Even now, I wouldn't swear that I have found them all. Those singles should be making an appearance here in the next day or so.

Matt Dennis on Capitol 78s

These days, Matt Dennis is mostly known for his compositions - Angel Eyes, Violets for Your Furs, The Night We Called It a Day, Everything Happens to Me, all available in superb Sinatra renditions - but he also was one of the finest singers of the post-war era.

Dennis displayed his vocal talent throughout several LPs released in the 50s, all or almost all of which have been re-released. But before then he made a number of records with Paul Weston for Capitol, beginning in 1946. This post captures nine of those sides, as found in my collection of 78s.

None of these records contain Dennis' own compositions, although you will find contemporaries such as Hoagy Carmichael (above) and Johnny Mercer (below). Mercer, I believe, wrote the lyrics to (Love's Got Me in a) Lazy Mood, with the music by tenor saxophonist Eddie Miller, who plays on the record.

Dennis did not have the voice of many if not most pop singers - although anyone who once was a vocal coach for Jo Stafford and her sisters must have known something about singing - yet his style and sensitivity are very winning. He could handle songs of all types, including the A Trout, No Doubt, a nonsense song like Swinging on a Star, without the moral. The Trout is part of today's catch, and just to make sure you get its full effect, I have corrected its speed, which apparently was increased to get the song under three minutes.

Update: I've repitched and remastered all these sides.