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The Astaire Story / Fred Astaire [sound recording]

Title

The Astaire Story [Sound Recording]

Performer

Astaire, Fred

Published/Created

1952-12

Genre

Sound Recording

Abstract

The Astaire Story, Verve compact disc 835649-2 (1989)
Recorded December 1952 in Los Angeles and produced by Norman Granz, one of the first to experiment with on-the-spot recordings, and with studio recordings that took advantage of the longer playing time of the LP (Four twelve-inch LPs). "The Astaire Story" featured Astaire singing 34 vocal numbers and three tap dances accompanied by Oscar Peterson (piano), Ray Brown (bass), Avin Stoller (drums), Barney Kessel (guitar), and, in all but nine numbers, Flip Phillips (tenor saxophone) and Charlie Shavers (trumpet).

Astaire's voice range is narrow and his is a small, fragile voice; but the simplicity of his sound is gorgeously compiled by this skillfully-tuned company and arrangements of the jazz ensemble which do not tread past F, Astaire's range. "It is a pleasure to hear him unfettered by visual images and a large orchestra" wrote Whitney Balliett. The arrangement of the tunes foregrounds the lyrics, which in the movie musical production numbers are only one part of the equation of dancing, orchestra, and scenography of the shooting of the scene. These recordings foreground the beauty and straightforwardly romantic lyrics, his tenderness; the lyrics directly reference and associate falling in love with dancing and in a sad way, the direct relationship with those tunes and Astaire's tap dancing is blurred; instead of tapping during the breaks/brides/instrumental sections of the tunes, there is instead Oscar Peterson's ensemble, and it is hardly as disappointing as one might expect.

Three tap dances recorded with the rhythm section at tempos ranging from medium to very fast include "Fast Dance" (Ad Lib 2'4"); "Slow Dances" (Ad Lib 2'55"), and "Medium Dance" (Ad Lib 2:10). The latter two are blues: "You know this album is a kind of jazz album too, and jazz means the blues" Astaire speaks at the intro of the Slow and Medium Dance, "Oscar, Barney, Alvin and Ray are going to ad lib some of those blues now and I'm going to walk in and throw a little hoofing in there. We like these slow blues so much we decided to do two a couple." Peterson plays the head and Astaire whistles and claps and slaps the ball of his foot; no taps are heard; the tune is piano played in some places of stop time to feature Astaire's double time; though rhythmically succinct, it is difficult to appreciate the rhythm tapping alone because so much of Astaire's tap dancing is purposely full-bodied; he does gain some momentum and the rhythmic phrasing gains energy and complexion when he engages in trading choruses with the piano, guitar; but even in these trades, it is audibly clear that Astaire's ad-lib tapping is slippery light and without real rhythmic development; it is a one-and two-sentence response to the musicians who have clearly imbued him with energy.

Whitney Balliett wrote: "The three tap dances . . . are good, exciting Astaire tapping-- often offbeat, legato, and full of his typical sailing-through-the-air open spaces."

Source

Balliett, Whitney: Collected Works : A Journal of Jazz 1954-2000. St. MartinÕs Press (2000).

Last Updated: 12-16-2015