Released 1958 Length 38:11 Release date 1958 | Recorded 1958 Producer Simon Rady Label Bluebird Records | |
Fancy Meeting You Here(1958) How the West Was Won(1959) Fancy Meeting You Here(1958) Hymns From the Heart(1959) Genres Jazz, Traditional pop music, Vocal jazz Similar Bing Crosby albums, Traditional pop music albums | ||
Fancy Meeting You Here is a 1958 RCA Victor studio album of duets by the American singers Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney, arranged by Billy May who also conducted the orchestra. It was issued in mono and stereo, catalog number LPM/LSP 1854. The concept behind Fancy Meeting You Here was a combination of romance and travel, with songwriters Sammy Cahn and James Van Heusen contributing introductory and concluding versions of "Love Won't Let You Get Away" as well as a tune called "Fancy Meeting You Here," and Cahn writing special lyrics to standards like "How About You?" and "I Can't Get Started" that reflected the late 1950s and the personalities of the two singers. Billy May conducted, and contributed his usual lively arrangements. All of that served as a setting for the always appealing interaction between Crosby and Clooney.
Contents
In 1969, the album was reissued on the budget RCA Camden label under the title Rendezvous (CAS-2330) with a truncated and re-sequenced track listing. This reissue destroyed the concept of the original album, and the abridgment, which lost the first version of "Love Won't Let You Get Away" as well as "Calcutta" and "Isle of Capri," further voided the concept.
The album first appeared on compact disc in 1988, when it was issued by RCA in Japan. Taragon Records reissued the album In 2000, on a "twofer" CD coupled with the 1960 RCA Victor Rosemary Clooney album Clap Hands! Here Comes Rosie! In 2001, the album was given a 24-bit Digital remastering and reissued on CD on RCA's Bluebird Records label. Bonus tracks from both Clooney (2 duets with Bob Hope) and Crosby (audio duets with Jo Stafford from a March 2, 1959 "The Bing Crosby Show" on ABC-TV) were also included.
Clooney and Crosby would record a second similar album of duets, That Travelin' Two-Beat for Capitol Records in 1964.
Reception
In its review on January 12, 1959, Time magazine called this album, "An infectious musical dialogue between two of the sassiest fancy talkers in the business. C. & C. give slick and witty readings to a selection of retreads — On a Slow Boat to China, You Came a Long Way from St. Louis — and introduce a punchy, potential hit named Calcutta. One of the most intriguing vocal entertainments since Noël Coward had his famous chat with Mary Martin."
Variety summarised the album as: "Two savvy singers team up in a charming rundown of a dozen numbers for a pop set with adult appeal."
Billboard also liked it, saying: "A lot of charm here — A flock of tunes carrying different place names, carrying out the idea of the album title... Cover also carries out the theme. Performances are very smart, with occasional interpolations and asides by Crosby and Clooney. Arranged and conducted in grand style by Billy May."
The British publication The Gramophone in their April 1959 edition went further. "Even so for the duet-warbling of the month I would turn to RCA SF5022 (Mono RD27105): “Fancy Meeting You Here” with Rosemary Clooney and the old groaner himself, Bing Crosby, bumping amicably into each other in a dozen stage sets scattered around the world...The Billy May accompaniments throughout are first class, and so, obviously, is the singing; but principally it is the infectious easygoing good humor of the record which remains in the mind. That, and an occasional twist of lyric; no record can be neglected which ends a nostalgic and twang-ridden version of the “Isle of Capri” with “I’ve often felt that we both might have stayed there, if it weren’t for those stale mandolins.”
Personnel
Songs
Fancy Meeting You Here2:32
(I'd Like to Be) On a Slow Boat to China2:41
I Can't Get Started3:50