Cabaret Film

Tom Waits collaborated with director Robert Wilson and librettist William Burroughs on the musical stage work The Black Rider in 1990. A variation on the Faust legend, the 19th century German story allowed Waits to indulge his affection for the music of Kurt Weill and address one of his favorite topics of recent years, the devil. Waits had proven an excellent collaborator when he worked with director Francis Ford Coppola on One from the Heart, making that score an integral part of the film. Here, the collaboration and the established story line served to focus Waits' often fragmented attention, lending coherence and consistency. He then had three years to adapt the score into a record album in which he did most of the singing and writing…

2009 double CD release of digitally remastered recordings combining a trio of sensational original 1960s Capitol albums from the legendary vocalist, actress and performer (1964's Liza! Liza!, 1965's It Amazes Me and 1966's There Is a Time) plus versions of singles previously unavailable on CD; rare and unreleased recordings from Judy & Liza Live at the London Palladium and tracks from the New York, New York film soundtrack. Booklet includes sleeve notes by Will Friedwald and rare photos. EMI.

Michel Legrand's abundantly lyrical soundtrack to Jacques Demy's 1964 movie musical The Umbrellas of Cherbourg faithfully evokes the film's predominant theme of young love foiled by adult reality. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg's overriding melancholia finds a voice in two main melodic motifs Legrand uses throughout the soundtrack, the first from the Legrand jazz standard "Watch What Happens" and the second from his song "I Will Wait for You." Legrand's considerable arranging abilities are on display here as he works the recurring themes through a variety of settings: tragic duets cloaked in dramatic string passages, broken-down cabaret soliloquies, and even a tango piece à la Astor Piazzolla. A prevalent jazz waltz theme also seesaws its way through the score, providing a break from the gloom. As with his later Demy soundtrack, The Young Girls of Rochefort, Legrand does integrate jazz into the mix, but not in such pervasive fashion; occasional big-band outbursts and light jazz backgrounds ultimately take a back seat to Legrand's preferred chanson mode. Combining Debussy's opaque melodies and Richard Rodgers song economy, he transforms the whimsical French song of Piaf and Trenet into petite arias. For Legrand it comes down to the song, and there are plenty of good ones on The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.

The most exotic actress of the 1930s and '40s, Marlene Dietrich performed her cabaret act around the world and recorded for Decca, Columbia and Capitol in the post-war period, after her film career had slowed. A thick German accent and her odd sung-spoken vocal style proved no barrier to international popular success and adoration.

2014 original album series 5 CD set, in LP replica papersleeves. Collects five classic UK Mersey beat albums: Gerry & the Pacemakers' "How Do You Like It?" (1963) & "Ferry Cross the Mersey" (1965), plus the Swinging Blue Jeans' "Blue Jeans A'Swinging" (1964), Billy J Kramer with the Dakotas' "Listen…" and the Fourmost "The First & the Fourmost (1965)…