[Dixielandjazz] Peggy Lee Reviewed

[Robert Ringwald]

Peggy Lee: Let's Love / Two Shows Nightly
by John Wirt
Baton Rouge Advocate, February 5, 2010

>From 1943's "Why Don't You Do Right" to 1969's "Is That All There Is?," singer-songwriter
Peggy Lee released hits through three decades. Having already demonstrated an ear
for '60s songwriters Jimmy Webb, Burt Bacharach, Randy Newman and more, she collaborated
with none other than Paul McCartney for her 1974 album, Let's Love.
If anything fits the description "buried treasure," Let's Love is it. McCartney,
a Lee fan since his youthful days in Liverpool, wrote Let's Love's title track specifically
for her. He also arranged, produced and recorded the song's music tracks at Abby
Road Studios in London in advance of Lee adding her vocals in Los Angeles. The song's
simple, lovely melodies are unmistakably McCartney and completely in tune with Lee's
understated expressivity. The balance of Let's Love, a record made with commercial
success in mind but also fresh and accomplished in its own right, includes Lee's
performance of Melissa Manchester's gospel-toned "He Is the One," her laid-back but
never lazy take on James Taylor's "Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight" and Irving Berlin's
"Always" performed as if Sly and the Family Stone had given the song a funk injection.
Despite Lee being in fine form, McCartney's lovely contribution, co-producer Dave
Grusin and supervision by Atlantic Records co-founder Nesuhi Ertegun, Let's Love
was a sales disappointment. This re-release gives an underappreciated project from
one of music's most distinctive and versatile artists another chance.
There's more buried treasure in Lee's Two Shows Nightly, an in-concert disc recorded
over three nights at New York City's Copacabana nightclub in 1968. The singer, dissatisfied
with the album's final mix, asked Capitol Records to withdraw already pressed and
ready to ship LPs from distribution. Capitol's decision to honor her request made
collectors' items out of the LP's promo copies.
This new edition of Two Shows Nightly presents a thoroughly modern Lee who'd recently
begun working with the producers behind the Turtles, Gary Lewis and the Playboys
and the Lovin' Spoonful. She nimbly interprets '60s hits by the Spoonful, Glen Campbell,
Frank and Nancy Sinatra, Broadway selections and songs by folk singers Buffy Sainte-Marie
and Tim Hardin. Lee, in fact, recorded "Reason to Believe" three years before Rod
Stewart did his hit rendition of the Hardin song.


--Bob Ringwald K6YBV
rsr at ringwald.com
Fulton Street Jazz Band
916/806-9551

Check out our latest recording at www.ringwald.com/recordings.htm

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