crisp

The Original Jacket Collection classical sets that Sony does. They also did a few jazz sets that way, such ads Brubeck, Dexter, Blakey. They are good to look at and handle and are quite space efficient.

Yep. I broadly see easy listening as I describe it as an attempt to keep up with the times. Not just with the songs but the styles. It was mocked at the time, but I find it rather touching that middle-aged people then were seeking a path between their music (big bands and string orchestras) and the music of their children (Beatles, folk, psychedelia). It resulted in a lot of enjoyable music for people of my generation (born 1968) who like both. It clearly had its origins in SABP music too -- that desire to bring an established genre up to date.

Makes sense to me. I think of what you call SABP music as distinct from easy listening, which came later and encompasses the now sound and jet set stuff you mention. When I googled the origins of the term “easy listening”, I got: "it was coined in 1965 by Claude Hall, radio-TV editor of Billboard magazine". He may have had his own idea of what the term meant, but I see it as very different from what happened before the mid-Sixties, which is as you say more closely allied with jazz. Easy listening I would broadly define as orchestras attempting to do post-rock and roll pop (eg Ray Conniff doing Paul Simon songs). So 1964 is a good cut-off point for SABP music.

I recall discovering Mosaic in the late 1990s when my office got connected to the internet. I probably found them via the old BNBB. It took me a minute to figure out that these were legit releases -- and in fact by the same people who did the mainstream BN CDs sold in regular shops. Since I had a bit of catching up to do I would buy them in batches adding up to 12 CDs to sneak in on a particular shipping threshold to the UK. So my first order was for three four-disc sets: Teagarden Capitol, Kenton Presents and Stuff Smith. It was a memorable moment when they arrived -- as others have said upthread, you simply couldn't believe you finally owned this music. FWIW I quickly followed that order with one for JJ Johnson and Teddy Wilson, then (I think as a Christmas present to myself) the big 12-disc Capitol set. Magical stuff.

I think this is Mosaic's Lionel Hampton set. It's split into two-disc sections. Also on Spotify

I'm pretty sure this is the Freddie Slack Select. Also on Spotify. Kenton Presents here too. Also on Spotify.

I'm not sure about that. Sondheim praised the lyrics of Hart's contemporary Cole Porter and compared Hart's work unfavourably with that of Dorothy Fields and Frank Loesser, whom he also liked. I think Sondheim understood vintage musicals very well; he was unimpressed with the craftsmanship of Hart. I think I agree with him actually. BTW I'm not completely sold on Sondheim's critical acumen. I have his book Finishing the Hat in which he also attacks Noel Coward, which is nuts, and praises DuBose Heyward and Truman Capote as lyricists -- each of them wrote just one show each and I can't say I'm very impressed with their work there.

Also on Spotify (and to buy elsewhere on download) is Woody Herman, The Phillips Recordings. Pretty sure this is the Mosaic Select

New comp: Lux And Ivy Dig Crime Jazz – Film Noir Grooves & Dangerous Liaisons. Details here.

I think someone misunderstood the brief. Anyway, Jacques Prévert, one of the writers of Autumn Leaves, was a poet and screenwriter. The song is actually a setting of one of his poems, it seems. Ill-fated singer Russ Columbo co-wrote Prisoner of Love The actor Gene Lockhart co-wrote The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise. And how could we forget Bertolt Brecht, who co-wrote Mack the Knife?

Denny Zeitlin The Columbia Studio Sessions on Spotify looks as if it might be the Mosaic Select.

Joe Pesci didn't write The Folks Who Live On The Hill

Well Lehar was no amateur either. I interpreted the topic as people outside general songwriting, so film and operetta composers would be OK, but it doesn't matter. More: Al Jolson contributed to a number of songs; Avalon is probably the best known jazzwise. One of the writers of Too Close For Comfort, Larry Holofcener, was later known as a sculptor (he did that one of Churchill and Roosevelt in New Bond Street in London). Film director Victor Schertzinger co-wrote I Don't Want To Cry Anymore and I Remember You. Eric Maschwitz, who co-wrote These Foolish Things, later became controller of the BBC (among many other achievements). Anthony Newley was an actor who also co-wrote many songs, including the Bill Evans favourites Who Can I Turn To and What Kind of Fool Am I. And maybe slightly outside jazz (but since you liked the politicians...): screenwriter Edmund Goulding co-wrote Love, Your Spell Is Everywhere and Mam'selle; novelist William Saroyan co-wrote Come On-A My House; and film director Leo McCarey co-wrote the title song for his film An Affair To Remember.

Bing Crosby, I Don't Stand a Ghost of a Chance With You Charlie Chaplin, Smile David Raksin, Laura Sigmund Romberg, Lover Come Back to Me & Softly As In a Morning Sunrise Franz Lehár, Vilia Eden Ahbez, Nature Boy Bronislau Kaper, On Green Dolphin Street & All God's Chillun Got Rhythm Truman Capote, A Sleepin Bee (Of course on some of these the contribution was minimal) Maybe not jazz standards, but It's All in the Game was written by US vice president Charles G. Dawes and You Are My Sunshine by Louisiana governor Jimmie Davis

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