DeepDiscount.com

1950-1951 on CD

This CD opens with a quartet session on "I Wanna Be Loved" - Dinah Washington had also recorded the same song in 1950. Ammons' regular band opens with "Back In Your Own Backyard" which Billie Holiday made famous in 1938. Ammons is hardly known as a vocalist, but sings on "Sweet Jennie Lou" and "'Round About One a.m." The extended "Stringin' The Jug" is followed by two ballads on which Sonny Stitt takes a break. What a pity that the charming "A Lover Is Blue" has not been recorded more often over the years. Ammons takes a bow to Herschel Evans on "Blue And Sentimental," but the echo effect, quite popular in the early '50s, sounds very odd today. Modelled on the successfull version from the previous March, the "New Blues Up And Down" in two parts is the highlight of this CD.