James Taylor American Standard

For pop artists of a certain generation, taking on the Great American Songbook has become somewhat of a rite of passage, occasionally bordering on cliché. Some, like Linda Ronstadt and Carly Simon, got to it early in their careers, while legacy boomers like Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney offered up their reinterpretations of jazz standards as late-career curiosities, or in the case of Rod Stewart - five volumes and counting - reinvented themselves with them. James Taylor is no stranger to cover songs; everything from early rock to Motown and cowboy songs have popped up in his catalog, not to mention a pair Christmas albums and an entire 2008 set called Covers. As one of the most revered American singer/songwriters of the mid- to late 20th century, it seems almost inevitable that he would eventually take his turn to honor the generation of pop tunesmiths that preceded him…

For pop artists of a certain generation, taking on the Great American Songbook has become somewhat of a rite of passage, occasionally bordering on cliché. Some, like Linda Ronstadt and Carly Simon, got to it early in their careers, while legacy boomers like Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney offered up their reinterpretations of jazz standards as late-career curiosities, or in the case of Rod Stewart - five volumes and counting - reinvented themselves with them. James Taylor is no stranger to cover songs; everything from early rock to Motown and cowboy songs have popped up in his catalog, not to mention a pair Christmas albums and an entire 2008 set called Covers. As one of the most revered American singer/songwriters of the mid- to late 20th century, it seems almost inevitable that he would eventually take his turn to honor the generation of pop tunesmiths that preceded him…

“These songs were written to be performed by anyone,” veteran folk-pop giant James Taylor tells Apple Music of his covers collection of 14 American standards—called, naturally, American Standard (and not to be confused with the popular toilet brand of the same name). These evergreen tunes, including “My Blue Heaven,” “Ol’ Man River,” and “Pennies From Heaven,” are rarely associated with any particular artist, making them ripe for constant reinvention, which was the songwriters’ intention all along. “The songwriting was all there was in the era that these songs were written, because they would be sheet music—they'd be part of a musical, and who knew who was going to be cast singing these parts. All you had to carry a song was the melody, the lyric, and the changes.”

James Vernon Taylor (born March 12, 1948) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold more than 100 million records worldwide…

Although it's only his debut record, American Music reveals Danny Gatton to already be an innovative and supremely gifted guitarist; here he tackles a sprawling range of music, moving easily from rockabilly to jazz to blues.

Tony Bennett has so many adoring celebrity fans it should come as no surprise that when a major duets album is planned, he's able to draw a roster of the biggest recording stars from the rock and vocal worlds, plus a pair of country music wildcards. (This despite the fact that he recorded an album with several duets in 2001, and a full-album collaboration one year later with k.d. lang.) One surprise is how well producer Phil Ramone paired Bennett with both duet partners and fitting standards – among them Barbra Streisand on the optimist's anthem "Smile," Dixie Chicks for the flapper standard "Lullaby of Broadway," Bono on the wickedly spiteful "I Wanna Be Around," Tim McGraw on "Cold, Cold Heart" (the Hank Williams song that was Bennett's biggest country crossover hit), Stevie Wonder on his own "For Once in My Life," Juanes for "The Shadow of Your Smile" (which was a hit first for the Brazilian Astrud Gilberto), and Sting on the torch song "Boulevard of Broken Dreams."

Chip Taylor will probably always be known as the songwriter who wrote "Wild Thing" and "Angel of the Morning." Born John Wesley Voight (actor Jon Voight is his older brother), Taylor began playing country music while still in high school in Yonkers, New York. After finishing high school, he briefly took up his father's occupation, becoming a professional golfer.

McKendree Spring is a progressive folk-rock band, active mainly in the early 1970s. The band consisted of Fran McKendree (vocals and guitar), their first bass player was Larry Tucker (shown in the picture) then Fred Holman took over bass, Dr. Michael Dreyfuss (electric violin, viola, Moog, Arp, Mellotron), Martin Slutsky (electric guitar)…