- This outstanding pressing, only the second copy to EVER hit the site, boasts outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
- Huge and powerful, Basie’s horns are really blastin’ on this copy
- Sassy’s remarkable vocal range and flexibility are on full display here, singing favorites including “I Got A Right To Sing The Blues,” “When Your Lover Has Gone,” and, of course, the title track
- “Sarah Vaughan is accompanied by her regular rhythm section of the early ’80s, guitarist Freddie Green, and the Count Basie horn sections on this enjoyable date… Sassy is in superb form…” – Allmusic
A wonderful recording by one of our favorite engineers, Dennis Sands, the man behind the amazing Basie album, Farmers Market Barbecue.
What do the best Hot Stamper pressings give you?
- Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
- Then: presence and immediacy. The vocals aren’t “back there” somewhere, lost in the mix. They’re front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt would put them.
- The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
- Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.
- Tight punchy bass — which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.
- Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.
- Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.
A Big Group of Musicians Needs This Kind of Space
One of the qualities that we don’t talk about on the site nearly enough is the SIZE of the record’s presentation. Some copies of the album just sound small — they don’t extend all the way to the outside edges of the speakers, and they don’t seem to take up all the space from the floor to the ceiling. In addition, the sound can often be recessed, with a lack of presence and immediacy in the center.
Other copies — my notes for these copies often read “BIG and BOLD” — create a huge soundfield, with the music positively jumping out of the speakers. They’re not brighter, they’re not more aggressive, they’re not hyped-up in any way, they’re just bigger and clearer.
And most of the time those very special pressings are just plain more involving. When you hear a copy that does all that — a copy like this one — it’s an entirely different listening experience.
TRACK LISTING
Side One
I Got A Right To Sing The Blues
Just Friends
If You Could See Me Now
Ill Wind
When Your Lover Has Gone
Side Two
Send In The Clowns
I Hadn’t Anyone Till You
All The Things You Are
Indian Summer
From This Moment On
AMG Review
Sarah Vaughan is accompanied by her regular rhythm section of the early ’80s (with pianist George Gaffney, bassist Andy Simpkins, and drummer Harold Jones), guitarist Freddie Green, and the Count Basie horn sections on this enjoyable date. The arrangements by Sammy Nestico and Allyn Ferguson unfortunately do not leave much room for any of the Basie sidemen to solo, but Sassy is in superb form.
She is at her best on “I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues,” a remake of “If You Could See Me Now,” and a rapid “When Your Lover Has Gone,” although some listeners may enjoy her overly dramatic rendition of “Send in the Clowns.”
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