Anita O'Day

This release looks like yet another anthology of her hits but in fact is a collection of live broadcasts. The audio quality is not as good as from studio recordings.

You Betcha Review by John Bush

You Betcha, a compilation of Anita O'Day's big-band years released on Sounds of Yesteryear, reprises most of her early career's best-known features -- "And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine," "Let Me Off Uptown," and "Honeysuckle Rose" -- whether they were for the orchestras of Stan Kenton, Gene Krupa, or (briefly) Benny Goodman. Although a few more of her solid early sides appear, the rest of the compilation is filled out with an odd assortment of '40s and '50s material, all of it passable but none of it adding up to the type of Anita O'Day compilation that belongs in the first rank.

1. Tea For Two

2. Opus One

3. All Reet

4. Otto Make That Riff Stacato

5. Bolero At The Savoy

6. Ride On

7. Build It Up

8. And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine

9. You Betcha

10. Special Delivery

11. I Lost My Sugar In Salt lake City

12. Four Brothers

13. Ooh Hot Dog

14. Let Me Off Uptown

15. Honeysuckle Rose

Anita Belle Colton (October 18, 1919 – November 23, 2006), known professionally as Anita O'Day, was an American jazz singer and self proclaimed “song stylist” widely admired for her sense of rhythm and dynamics, and her early big band appearances that shattered the traditional image of the "girl singer". Refusing to pander to any female stereotype, O'Day presented herself as a "hip" jazz musician, wearing a band jacket and skirt as opposed to an evening gown. She changed her surname from Colton to O'Day, pig Latin for "dough", slang for money.

O'Day, along with Mel Tormé, is often grouped with the West Coast cool school of jazz. Like Tormé, O'Day had some training in jazz drums (courtesy of her first husband Don Carter)..While maintaining a central core of hard swing, O'Day's skills in improvisation of rhythm and melody rank her among the pioneers of bebop...While performing she met Gene Krupa, who promised to call her if Irene Daye, then his vocalist, ever left his band.The call from Krupa came in early 1941. Of the 34 sides she recorded with Krupa, it was "Let Me Off Uptown", a novelty duet with Roy Eldridge, that became her first big hit. The same year, DownBeat named O'Day "New Star of the Year". 

She joined Stan Kenton's band in April 1944. During her 11 months with Kenton, O'Day recorded 21 sides, both transcription and commercial, and appeared in a Universal Pictures short Artistry in Rhythm (1944). "And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine" (1944) became a huge seller, and put Kenton's band on the map.

      12. Four Brothers

Anita Harris

 Anita Madeleine Harris (born 3 June 1942) is an English actress, singer and entertainer.

She appeared in the Carry On films Follow That Camel (1967) and Carry On Doctor (1967).

She performed in a vocal group known as the Granadiers and then spent three years with the Cliff Adams Singers. She was still in her teens when John Barry's manager, Tony Lewis, offered her a recording contract by EMI and made her first recordings with the John Barry Seven — a group which was a successful chart act. This first single, a double A-side of "I Haven't Got You", written by Lionel Bart and "Mr One and Only", did not reach the charts.

Subsequent to their meeting, when they both auditioned for a musical revue, Mike Margolis and Harris formed a personal and professional relationship marrying in 1973. He became her manager and wrote the songs which served as her second and third singles: "Lies"/"Don't Think About Love"(Vocalion, September 1964) and "Willingly"/"At Last Love" (Decca, February 1965).

In January 1965 she performed at the San Remo Music Festival. Her duet with Beppe Cardile, "L'amore è partito", failed to reach the finals but even to participate in such a star-studded event augured well for her stardom. She made her label debut for Pye Records with the May 1965 release "Trains and Boats and Planes", although rival versions by both the song's composer Burt Bacharach (with vocals by the Breakaways) and Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas eclipsed her recording. She had four subsequent releases on Pye, including the only evident recording of the Burt Bacharach/ Hal David composition "London Life".In 1966, she moved to CBS Records where her debut release was also her debut album: Somebody's in My Orchard. Her chart breakthrough came in the summer of 1967 with the single "Just Loving You", a Tom Springfield composition which singer Dusty Springfield had suggested her brother give to Harris after the two women had performed on the same episode of Top of the Pops.Recorded at Olympic Studios in a session produced by Margolis and featuring harmonica virtuoso Harry Pitch, "Just Loving You" had been released in January 1967 but did not reach the UK Top 50 until 29 June 1967. Even after peaking at No. 6 on 26 August 1967 "Just Loving You" remained in the UK Top 40 until the end of the year, and was reported to have accumulated UK sales of 625,000 in six months. Besides charting at No. 18 in Ireland, "Just Loving You" was a Top Ten hit in South Africa where sales reached 200,000 copies. The disc was released in September 1967 in the United States where it rose to No. 20 on the "Easy Listening" chart in Billboard and approached the mainstream Pop "Hot 100" chart. It rose no higher than No. 120 on the "Bubbling Under" chart. In January 1968 Harris made her only appearance on the UK album chart when her Just Loving You album reached No. 29.

The sustained interest in "Just Loving You" predicated a mild chart impact for her follow-up single "The Playground", released in September 1967. This reached its chart peak of No. 46 by 28 October 1967, the same week "Just Loving You" (which had dropped out of the Top 20 at No. 21) returned to the Top 20 for three more weeks.After just missing the UK Top 50 with the single "We're Going on a Tuppenny Bus Ride" (released 17 May 1968), she made her final chart appearance with her rendition of "Dream a Little Dream of Me". Released on 26 July 1968, her single version peaked in the UK Top 50 at No. 33, whilst the Mama Cass Elliot version peaked at No. 11.

1. Anniversary Waltz

2. You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling

3. Land Of Dragon Dreams

4. Here Comes The Night

5. The Playground

6. Just Loving You

1. Ave Maria

2. Turn Around

3. Crying For The Near

4. My Favourite Occupation

5. The Night Has Flown

6. Beatles Rhapsody

      6. Beatles Rhapsody

Andrienne Posta

A trip now to the 60's and an Actress/Singer from some classic comedy and  kitchen sink films !! that's what they called real life drama's in the 60's !......great recording of "Close To You" just shows what a cool voice Adrienne has...some great retro tracks to take your memory back !!

1. Only Fifteen

2. Shang A Doo Lang

3. He Doesn't Love Me

4. The Winds That Blow

5. When A Girl Really Loves You

6. Something Beautiful

7. They Long To Be Close To You

8. How Can I Hurt You

9. Backstreet Girl

10. Cruising Casanova

Adrienne Posta (born Adrienne Marsha Poster, 1 March 1949) is an English film and television actress and singer, prominent during the 1960s and 1970s. She adopted the surname 'Posta' in 1966....Posta appeared in films such as To Sir with Love (1967)and Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush, Up the Junction (both 1968), Spring and Port Wine (1970), and Carry On Behind (1975). She also featured in many TV programmes, including the first episode of Budgie (1971), where she appeared as a stripper. She appeared throughout the BBC 1 series It's Lulu (1973), singing, dancing and acting alongside her friend Lulu and comedian Roger Kitter.

Posta also recorded a number of singles. She has worked as a teacher in the Midlands and at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts. Posta is an honorary patron of the Music Hall Guild of Great Britain and America.

       7. They Long To Be Close To You

       6. How Can I Hurt You

The 50 Guitars of Tommy Garrett

Guitars galore !!...go continental !

Tommy ( Snuff ) Garrett

Snuff Garrett was an A&R man and a record producer in the 50's and 60's. Although his name may not be well known to those who enjoy the pop music of that era, many of the records that he produced and the people with whom he worked are quite well known.

He was born Thomas Garrett in Dallas, Texas in 1939. 

He produced a series of albums throughout the 60's that featured guitarist Tommy Tedesco, called 50 Guitars Of Tommy Garrett. In the mid-60's, working with arranger Leon Russell at Liberty, Garrett managed to produce seven straight top ten hits with Gary Lewis and the Playboys.

      3. Summertime In Venice

Keely Smith

Dorothy Jacqueline Keely (March 9, 1928 – December 16, 2017), better known as Keely Smith, was an American jazz and popular music singer, who performed and recorded extensively in the 1950s with then-husband Louis Prima, and throughout the 1960s as a solo artist.

Smith married Prima in 1953. The couple were stars throughout the entertainment business, including stage, television, motion pictures, hit records, and cabaret acts. They won a Grammy in 1959, its inaugural year, for their smash hit, "That Old Black Magic", which remained on the charts for 18 weeks.

1. You're Breaking My Heart

2. The Wedding

3. I'll Always Be In Love With You

4. Turn Around Look At Me

5. When You Cry

6. I Can't Get You Out Of My Heart

1. Someday You'll Want Me To Want You

2. With All My Heart

3. Sunday Morning

4. Crazy

5. Look Again

6. Going Through The Motions

       1. Your Breaking My Heart