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Let's Face The Music
EP 1962:
Columbia Records, EMI England, mono: SEG 8273


The tracks of this EP are all taken from the 1962 album Let's Face The Music
 

Track Listing

Side A

01. Let's Face The Music And Dance
02. I Should Care

Side B
01. Let's Fall In Love
02. The Second Time Around
 
Sleeve Note 
By Patrick James

The teaming of giant talents doesn't always work; the greater the talents the greater, sometimes, the risk of collision. But when Vic Lewis brought Nelson Riddle to Britain in 1962 to accompany Shirley Bassey on a tour - a meeting of giants if ever there was one - it was a happy combination indeed. Miss Bassey, born in Wales, equipped with a huge voice and an instinctive way with words, had got to the very top in the space of half-a-dozen years or so. I first saw her in 1955 when she erupted into a variety bill in Oxford, completely unknown, and captivated an audience whose main thought for the evening had been to have Al Reed tickle its ribs. Good though he was, as the audience shuffled out afterwards it was Shirley Bassey's name you heard in every conversation. To the impact she was capable of then, she has since added the finesse that experience brings. Nelson Riddle, born into a family of New Jersey farmers, started Piano at eight, trombone in his teens, and was touring before he was twenty. His first arranging was for Charlie Spivak. He is now, I suspect, the arranger supreme of the better pop song; the man whose brilliant scores helped Sinatra to make his musical comeback in 1953. This record is the by-product, if you'll pardon the understatement, of the celebrated Bassey/ Riddle tour. It is a collection of great standards: Let's Face The Music from Irving Berlin's 1936 film score for 'Follow The Fleet'; Let's Fall In Love is the title song of a 1934 film. Mr. Crosby has had some success with Second Time Around. But it's I Should Care which seems to contain the secret of Shirley Bassey's convincing way with a song. To paraphrase its last line - she does care.


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