Track List
| Track 1 The Song Is You Track 2 Stardust Track 3 Bossa No No Track 4 Just Friends Track 5 Ko Ko Track 6 Embraceable You Track 7 He Ain't Got Rhythm Track 8 Bamboo Track 9 Someday My Prince Will Come Track 10 April In Paris Track 11 Out The Window Track 12 Supersax Track 13 Skylark Track 14 Straighten Up And Fly Right Track 15 Country Track 16 L.A.
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Liner Note
Back in May I got hit with an aneurism of the aorta, which went a long way toward convincing me that I'm probably not going to live forever. Faced with that, I began to took at things from a different perspective.
My dad used to ask me, "Son, do you think you'll ever amount to anything?" And I would reply, "No, Dad, I want to be just like you." And then we'd laugh.
Now I was asking myself if over the years I really have amounted to anything. Aside from a great family the only thing 1 have going for me is music.
Music has always been easy for me, which might explain why I've spent so much of my life with a board on my lap, scratching out Bird choruses rather than skimming the pool or bringing in groceries. The beauty of it is that all that scratching over the years has produced nine SUPERSAX albums and three more featuring the LA VOICES.
For the last twenty years the Voices have been doing a Rosebud in the bowels of some Sony warehouse, doomed and forgotten. All of Mauri Lathower's best efforts have fallen on deaf ears at Sony. So in order for people to be able to dig this album while I'm still alive, I've decided to put it out myself
In a way it's a memorial to those we've lost, The first to fall was Monty Budwig, then Conte Candoli, Lou Levy and Jay Migliori, all three in 2001. It was doubly sad for me, my wife Joanie having lost a ten year battle with Parkinson's in December of 2000.
Whenever I hear this album I'm back with all the guys, playing the word of Bird and warbling with the LA VOICES.
Gene Merlino and I go back to '56, the Ray Anthony show on ABC TV, where we played in the band and sang in the vocal group. Sue Ramey was featured on a few of the shows, just a kid but already the Voice, honest and sweet with a heart to match.
So twenty years later when I formed the LA VOICES I picked Sue for lead. Then I got Gene to ramrod the outfit; he picked alto Melissa Mackay and tenor John Balmer. The bass singer didn't show for our first rehearsal so I took over his part just for that one night. Yeah, right,
Melissa is rock solid as a group singer with a sound that reminds me a little of Anita O'Day. John has a great jazz feel, a rarity in tenors, and like Gene and Melissa has perfect intonation. With Sue as the girl next door on top and the rest of us weaving the changes under her, the result won us a Grammy nomination in '83.
Conte Candoli is the perfect soloist with that surreal instinct of his, a true son of Diz threading through the voices. And that sound...
Lou Levy brings an elegance to it all; the unerring sense of the best line, the best chord. Monty Buddwig works perfectly with Lou as they lay down the harmony. John Dentz plays pure swing time, with a cool disdain for showing off, exactly right for this enterprise.
Along with Joe Lopes and Warne Marsh, Jack, Jay and I comprised the original group. We won a Grammy and two more nominations in our first three albums for Mauri Lathower at Capitol. Along the way Lanny Morgan came in for Joe, and Ray Reed replaced Warne, so that's been the line up for the last twenty five years.
That's about it, I guess. Oh yeah, I wrote all the added material.
I hope you enjoy the music. -- Med
P.S. to the guys at Sony: Please feel free to take over at any time. After all, retail ain't my bag.
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