Track List
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Track 1: The Shining Sea 4:45 Track 2: The Shadow Of Your Smile 3:46 Track 3: Close Enough For Love 3:24 Track 4: Cinnamon And Clove 3:51 Track 5: Unless It's You 3:25 Track 6: Suicide Is Painless 3:36 Track 7: You Are There 4:27 Track 8: A Time For Love 3:39 Track 9: Emily 4:07 Track 10: Don't Look back 2:14
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Liner Note
Anyone with impeccable taste in music, such as ourselves, will see immediately that this is a great collaboration. Sue Raney singing vintage Johnny Mandel songs, accompanied by Florence, Magnusson and Plank (not the law firm, the musicians). Everyone got out of the way of the art, consequently everyone's art gleamed.
Miss Raney doesn't sell us. It sounds like she just showed up and the songs fell out. Such seeming effortlessness — like Fred and Ginger sliding out of their chairs and a whole song and dance just...occurs. There's a dreamlike quality when work is well conceived and properly completed.
Miss Raney's voice has never sounded sweeter or sunnier. She's also dead in tune in passages so tricky they'll make other singers squint. It all sounds so simple. She sips the lyrics for the fine wine they often are. No selfconscious lyric readings here ("How'm I doin', Ira?"). This is interested, respectful singing.
Pianist Bob Florence is a master in this delicate genre. Many think of him first as the guy whose big band keeps getting nominated for a Grammy. But his scaled down settings for Miss Raney are pure Tiffany.
Mandel makes a lyricist work hard. He's a sharp judge, and you want to please him. Peggy Lee never wrote a more touching lyric than "The Shining Sea." Paul Francis Webster's "The Shadow of Your Smile" doesn't really mean much, but so beautifully that you want to bathe in it. In "Close Enough for Love," Paul Williams says, "You and I have life to hold, the greatest story never told, not perfect yet but close enough for love." Close to perfectly said, both in and out of the film "Agatha." Alan and Marilyn Bergman's "Cinnamon and Clove" sits easily in its bright melody. "Unless It's You" is made up entirely of four-note phrases, each ending with a long note. I wrote open rhymes for each one, for the singer's sake. The music required that kind of effort. And Sue made me glad.
The lyric to "Suicide is Painless" from "Mash" was written by Mike Altman, the then fourteen-year-old son of director Bob Altman. Since no other lyricist on this album was ever fourteen, young Altman was stomping in high cotton. You'll notice. "You Are There" was written by Dave Frishberg, himself a superb composer, singer, pianist. Frishberg has a no-style style that is deeply touching, especially this time. "A Time For Love" is Paul Francis Webster again, liquid and languid. "Emily" is Johnny Mercer. A master speaks. Kaye Dunham wrote the comforting lyric to "Don't Look Back."
Footnotes I must note, space or not. I love how Bob Florence sets up his piano solo over his Rhodes track on "Cinnamon and Clove," and Sue's intro kills me too. A train wreck would not have disturbed her concentration on "You Are There," with a flawless solo from Florence. She takes a liberty on one note ("I'll go") toward the end of "The Shining Sea" that makes the song her own. She duets beautifully with Bob Magnusson's mellow bass on "Close Enough For Love." Jim Plank's drums and percussion feel as right as Raney. Since the album was recorded live in one day, we know that engineer Jim Mooney is world class at his job. it was all thoughtfully produced by Albert Marx.
I promised these notes would be short and it's Sue's fault that they're not.
--Morgan Ames
Personnel
Bob Florence - piano
Bob Magnusson - bass
Jim Plank - drums & percussion
Carmen Fanzone - flugelhorn
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