One of my all-time favourite singers, Cleo Laine (officially known as Dame Cleo Laine) is celebrating 95 years these days and I just thought about her this morning. I have discovered Laine during my "London years" when I was much younger and always loved her voice, her beauty, her music - she started in post WW2 UK and established herself as British Jazz royalty together with her husband John Dankworth - together they performed around the world and created a brilliant body of work that covered everything from Jazz to movie soundtracks, pop, easy listening, Shakespeare sonnets and Carole King. Along the way she eventually became discovered in US where she won "Grammy" in 1986, appeared on a theatre stage, in movies and musicals, opened a concert hall in her backyard (famous Stables) and recorded a long discography that is worth searching for, as her artistic inspiration resulted in many different directions and collaborations.
One of the albums long out of print but still worth searching for is 1982. "Smilin' Through" with Dudley Moore. This elegant, classy and sophisticated collaboration sound so natural and spontaneous that its actually wonder why it did not happen before - Dankworths and Moore were old friends from back in the 1960s swinging London but it took forever for them to get together and collaborate on an album. In the meantime Dankworths became international Jazz sensation and Moore a Hoollywood star - its easy to imagine them meeting again somewhere in Los Angeles and planning this long overdue album together. It is also a welcome return to Jazz music for Laine who has spent a good part of 1970s recording middle of the road pop crossover music and its good to hear her doing what she does best. Moore is an excellent pianist, Laine sounds excellent as always and this is superb album, nominated for 1983. Grammy.
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