Efrata Denny

Island's single-disc Sandy Denny compilation does its best to offer a compact overview of the iconic singer's work. Focusing on the four records completed before her death in 1978, the 17-track Listen Listen winds comfortably through career highlights like "The North Star Grassman and the Raven," "Blackwaterside," and the gorgeous title track. Fans will contest the omission of tracks like "Carnival" and "It Suits Me Well," but for such a slim collection – considering Denny's invaluable work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and the Strawbs – Listen Listen is a fine introduction to the artist's later days.

Sandy Denny - The Notes and the Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities (2012) {4CD Set Island 371 246-9 rec 1966-1978}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.29 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 700 Mb
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© 1966-78, 2012 Universal Island | 371 246-9
Folk / Acoustic / British Folk / Folk Rock

2010's mammoth, highly collectible and very limited, 19-disc Sandy Denny box set was truly a thing to behold, presenting the entirety of her career from studio to stage to front porch. It was a completist's dream, but it came with an exceptionally high price tag, which makes the appearance of 2011's Notes and the Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities a real gift for fans, especially those who already own the complete studio recordings, whether solo or with Fotheringay, Strawbs, or Fairport Convention. The handsome, limited-edition four-disc box skims the cream from the top of the myriad rarities, BBC sessions, demos, and outtakes that made the previous collection so remarkable (an intimate bedroom recording of Jackson C. Frank's "Blues Run the Game"; an early demo of Like an Old Fashioned Waltz's "Carnival" with previously unheard melodies and lyrics; a blistering alternate studio take of a Dave Swarbrick-less "Sailor's Life," and alternate versions of Fairport classics like "Matty Groves," "Come All Ye," and "Fotheringay"), resulting in a wonderful window into one of English folk music's most magnificent voices.

Sandy Denny - 19 Rupert St (1967) {Witchwood Media WMCD 2053 rel 2011}
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© 1967, 2011 Witchwood Media | WMCD 2053
Folk / Acoustic / British Folk / Folk Rock

Although little Sandy Denny material was released prior to her first album as part of Fairport Convention (1969's What We Did on Our Holidays), quite a few pre-Fairport recordings of the singer's survive, though they usually weren't made in the most technically sophisticated settings. This CD, recorded in the Glasgow home of folk singer Alex Campbell on August 5, 1967, was salvaged from a cassette and issued in 2011, when interest in Denny's work had escalated to a point where even documents of rather lo-fi quality held enough interest to merit a commercial release. This is clearly a recording for serious Denny fans because of those technical limitations; even some of the other home recordings from the time that have found both official and bootleg release boast superior sound.

Sandy Denny's plaintive voice, haunting songs, and folk-rock style live on in the popular music of the 21st century, particularly in the recordings of Natalie Merchant, who so much resembles her in vocal timbre and overall approach, but also in her influence on other singer/songwriters, male and female. Denny never got her due in the U.S. during her lifetime, with only her third solo album, 1973's Like an Old Fashioned Waltz, and her final album with Fairport Convention, 1975's Rising for the Moon, even making the American charts.

Denny Zeitlin - Both/And: Solo Electro-Acoustic Adventures (2013) {Sunnyside SSC 1352 rec 2003-2012}
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© 2003-12, 2013 Sunnyside Communications | SSC 1352
Jazz / Electonic / Avant-Garde Jazz / Acoustic Piano / Synthesizers / Keyboards

Pianist Denny Zeitlin has the distinction—among many others—of having written one of the loveliest of loves songs: "Love Theme From Invasion of the Bodysnatchers." The tune can be heard in its unadorned beauty on Zeitlin's Precipice (Sunnyside Records, 2010), the recording of an extraordinarily beautiful and adventurous solo concert. The original version of the tune, from the soundtrack of the 1978 movie, Invasion of the Bodysnatchers (1978)—a masterful remake of the classic 1954 science fiction film—was Zeitlin's lone effort at writing for film. Hired originally to do a "jazz" score, Zeitlin found it necessary—when plans changed—to convince the powers-that-be that he was indeed capable of writing music for symphony orchestra and electronics—the then-new-on-the scene synthesizers.