Product Description

The classic 1930 musical comedy in its world premiere recording, featuring a 28-piece orchestra and a cast of Broadway and jazz greats. An amazing roster of talent including Carolee Carmello (Kiss Me Kate, Parade), Gavin Creel (Thoroughly Modern Millie), Mario Cantone (Assassins and TV's Sex & The City), Mark Linn-Baker (A Year With Frog and Toad and TV's Perfect Strangers) and Jennifer Laura Thompson (Urinetown, Footloose) # is joined by bestselling jazz artists Ann Hampton Callaway, John Pizzarelli and Jessica Molaskey, all in loving tribute to one of the few female composers from the first half of the 20th Century: the legendary Kay Swift. With a new biography of the composer, entitled Fine and Dandy: The Life and Work of Kay Swift, due out June 1 from Yale University Press, this new recording is sure to attract the attention of Broadway and jazz music-lovers everywhere. Overture (Orchestra), Rich or Poor (Gavin Creel & Jennifer Laura Thompson), Fine and Dandy (Carolee Carmello & Mario Cantone), Machine Shop Opening (Mark Linn-Baker & Ensemble), Starting at the Bottom (Gavin Creel), Can This Be Love? (Carolee Carmello), I'll Hit a New High (Andrea Burns & Male Ensemble), Picnic Song (Ensemble), Let's Go Eat Worms in the Garden (Gavin Creel, Carolee Carmello & Ensemble), Can't We Be Friends? (John Pizzarelli & Jessica Molaskey), Up Among the Chimney Pots (Natalie Douglas), Whistling in the Dark (Jack Donahue), Etiquette (Mark Linn-Baker & Ensemble), The Jig-Hop (Andrea Burns & Ensemble), Nobody Breaks My Heart (Carolee Carmello), Can This Be Love? (reprise) (Jennifer Laura Thompson & Gavin Creel), Wedding Bells (Ensemble), Waltz (Deborah Tranelli), Finale Ultimo (Mario Cantone, Carolee Carmello & Ensemble), Once You Find Your Guy (Ann Hampton Callaway)

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Mary Rodgers is usually heralded as musical theater's sole woman composer, but this new recording of a long-lost gem introduces us to another brilliant member of Broadway's thin female ranks: Kay Swift. Collaborating with her husband, lyricist James Paul Warburg (writing as Paul James), Swift penned a splendid collection of tunes-in turn touching, daffy, percolating and tender-for this 1930 show. Taking place in the unlikely setting of a tool-and-die factory, Fine and Dandy is a bubbly jazz age musical full of melodic invention and lyrical twists. Fans of the Gershwins' 1920s oeuvre will adore this world-premiere recording, and in fact George is namechecked in the wonderful title track, in which Carolee Carmello and Mario Cantone compete in spirited one-upmanship. The CD also includes four songs written by Swift between 1929 and 1950; like Plain and Fancy, they serve to remind us that Swift was one of Broadway's unsung heroes. --Elisabeth Vincentelli

• Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5 x 5.5 x 0.25 inches; 3.2 ounces
• Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ P.S. Classics
• Date First Available ‏ : ‎ February 1, 2007
• Label ‏ : ‎ P.S. Classics
• Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 1