As Christmas approaches I try to cut off purchasing new
music but it has been hard this year. I’m in the middle of discovering a whole
bunch of new artists and I’m eager to give them my money. Luckily, I have a few
albums here and there to keep me busy while I wait. Here’s one of them.
Disc 1211 is… In the Wee Small Hours
Artist: Frank
Sinatra
Year of Release: 1955
What’s up with the Cover? Frank is the paragon of cool as
he steps out in the wee small hours for a smoke.
How I Came To Know It: My friend Gord was cleaning out a
bunch of his father’s old CDs. He took a few photos of the collection to see if
anything caught my eye.
How It Stacks Up: I have a bunch of Frank Sinatra, but two are
Greatest Hits packages and one is a live record. The only other album is “A
Swingin’ Affair” from 1957 (reviewed back at Disc 922). It is hard to
compare the jump and joy of that record with the quieter tones of “Small Hours”
but if I had to do it, I’ll give the edge to “A Swingin’ Affair”…by a hair.
Ratings: 4 stars but almost 5
“In the Wee Small Hours” is a lonely city street at
4 a.m. There is no traffic. There is no wind. There may be rain, or if not rain,
fog. It’s just you, your thoughts, and these songs helping you explore old
memories and lost lovers.
The songs are an introverted affair. Quiet,
contemplative numbers that despite being only two and a half and three and a
half minutes long still manage to take their time lazily meandering through
tales of unrequited love and regret. Despite this the music doesn’t put you in
a sulk, it just helps you realize that sometimes the only company you need is
your own.
Frank Sinatra is the greatest male jazz singer of
his time. He possesses a rich full tone, into which he can inject as little or
as much air as the occasion demands. His phrasing and timing are immaculate –
the kind of perfect imperfection that no amount of post-production could
recreate.
“In the Wee Small Hours” calls for a lot of reverie,
and Frank is the perfect person to express it. His performance is wistful, but
never absent-minded. Every word is a pearl, turning some pretty basic stories
of the lovelorn into something deep and meaningful.
Supporting Sinatra is arranger and conductor Nelson
Riddle. I wouldn’t have thought to look up Riddle’s name, except a fellow music
enthusiast who rides my bus mentioned how great he was (thank you, David). On “In
the Wee Small Hours” Riddle recognizes that these songs need a lot of quiet to
sink in, and he supplies understated string and piano flourishes, that
underscore every line Sinatra sings, while never upstaging him – as if that
were possible.
I’m not a big jazz fan, and one of the reasons is I’m
not fond of the overly creative melodic structures that value cleverness over
listenability. “In the Wee Small Hours” is the exception. Often Frank resolves
a melody in a surprising way, landing a note that feels slightly out of place,
and yet fits in that moment. His masterful performance makes me appreciate and
enjoy this experience, which I usually find annoying.
With so many “woe is me” tunes, this record could
have easily fallen into the world of the maudlin. It does nudge up against that
line here and there, but it never crosses over.
My main issue is that there are too many songs. Even
though the total play time is only 50 minutes, with 16 tracks all so similarly
themed, I was ready to be done the wallow a few tracks before the record
decided to end it.
Overall, though, “In the Wee Small Hours” is a vocal
masterpiece. It is the musical equivalent of spending an evening drinking scotch
and thinking fondly of old lovers. I can forgive that the reverie goes on a bit
longer than it should when it sounds this good.
Best
tracks: In the
Wee Small Hours, Mood Indigo, Glad to Be Unhappy, I Get Along Without You Very
Well, Can’t We Be Friends?, I’ll Be Around, It Never Entered My Mind
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