Man Tran, as The Manhattan Transfer are affectionately known amongst the aficionados have, believe it or not been around for 50 years. It just seems like yesterday when I first heard their classic versions of Operator, Tuxedo Junction, Blue Champagne and On a Little Street in Singapore.
With the exception of the previously unrecorded version of Artie Shaw's take on The Man I Love which is quite boppy, all the tracks are new arrangements of numbers from previous albums including On a Little Street in Singapore.
With backing from the Cologne based WDR Funkhausorchester the end product is grander and less jazzier than the originals prompting me to think if it ain't broke don't fix it. Of course if they hadn't rearranged them then the exercise would have been pointless and they couldn't let half a century go without recognition.
Don't get me wrong, it's an enjoyable album but I expect that, at the end of the day, it will be the originals I go back to.
The group are in London on Nov. 24 at the Queen Elizabeth Hall as part of the EFG and it has just been announced that the album has received a GRAMMY nomination! Lance
Agua; The Man I Love; Paradise Within; On a Little Street in Singapore; The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul; Twilight Zone:Twilight Tone; Blues For Harry Bosch; Chanson D'Amour; What Goes Around; God Only Knows. Craft Recordings.
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