Ben Bagley's Irving Berlin Revisited

At the time Ben Bagley did Irving Berlin Revisited, it was not so easy to gain access to Mr. Berlin’s “trunk.” But the song choices Bagley came up with were lesser-known Berlin titles, some had no real recordings, and so at the time the album was as refreshing as all his Revisited albums were back when they originally came out. As always, his cast was tops: Richard Chamberlain, Blossom Dearie, Dorothy Loudon, and Bobby Short. And as he usually did for his CD releases, he added some additional material. What makes this album one of the best of the Bagleys was Norman Paris arranging and conducting. In fact, this is one of Paris’s best and the band is really good.

Irving Berlin had his first major hit with “Alexander’s Ragtime Band. From there, there was no looking back. He became one of the most iconic and beloved songwriters in the history of popular music. Twenty original Broadway shows, fifteen original Hollywood films, and one hit after another. His catalog is a laundry list of The Great American Songbook classics. His shows include such classics as Ziegfeld Follies, Face the Music, As Thousands Cheer, Louisiana Purchase, Annie Get Your Gun, Call Me Madam, and his final Broadway show, Mr. President, and his films include Top Hat, Follow the Fleet, Carefree, Alexander’s Ragtime Band, Holiday Inn, This Is the Army, Blue Skies, Easter Parade, There’s No Business Like Show Business, White Christmas and more. As Jerome Kern wrote: “Irving Berlin has no place in American music – he is American music.”

As always with the Bagley albums, we have cleaned up the sound – this one was especially wacky to deal with – reversed channels on some songs and other sound issues. James Nelson has worked his magic here, so this sounds better than it ever has. And, of course, the great Harvey Schmidt cover art is always the icing on the Bagley cake. -KRITZERLAND