Franklin Mercer

This anthology has a distinct purpose-to demonstrate that while at Columbia Records, Aretha Franklin did some exceptionally fine, even memorable, ballad singing. Aretha's early pop career has been consistently denigrated. The conventional line has it that while at Columbia, she was drowned in a sea of strings, her sensibility withered by a steady diet of Tin Pan Alley material more suitable for Nancy Wilson or Diahann Carroll. Lord knows there were many bloated, catastrophic recordings during those years. And even some of her most sensitive ballad readings were hindered by arrangements and orchestrations that were far from sympathetic-either too lush and overblown, or prosaicly simple. For these reasons, this album is more an anthology of great moments than of fully realized productions. But these tentative excursions by a former gospel singer into a strange new world possess a rare delicacy and fervor.

Laughing on the Outside is the fifth studio album by American singer Aretha Franklin, Released on August 12, 1963 by Columbia Records. The album was recorded at Columbia Recording Studios in New York and Hollywood. These sessions found a 21-year-old Aretha Franklin recording Jazz Music and Pop Music standards, from Johnny Mercer to Duke Ellington. She is backed by the arrangements of Columbia producer Robert Mersey.

The most complete portrait ever drawn of the complex emotional connection between two of history’s towering leaders.

Since her youth Franklin had admired Dinah Washington, and it's a safe bet that the level of emotional commitment Washington brought to her work was a major influence on the blossoming style of Aretha, not to mention Washington's effortless sense of swing. Shortly before she died, Washington took appreciate notice of her acolyte as well. So Aretha's tribute to Washington is as logical as it is satisfying. Recorded when Aretha was just 21, Unforgettable is somewhat of a departure from her more R&B-oriented early work.