Photos of Peggy's albums

Thanks for that, Don.

Well, I'm pleased to announce that another "photo page" is ready for viewing now. This one is dedicated to later, post-Capitol albums:

[peggyleediscography.com]

Also, the two previously done pages have a few additional images. Most of those new images are trade advertisements for the albums:

[peggyleediscography.com]

[peggyleediscography.com]

Finally, I should mention that, starting today (January 1, 2011), the address for the full discography is a different one. We just "moved." So, if by any chance you have bookmarked the discography's page, be aware that the previous address will soon go dead, and that the new address is

[peggyleediscography.com]

Up next: pages dedicated to EPs, to twofers, and to Benny Goodman material.

Wishing everybody here a Happy New-Lee Year, and all that jazz,
Ivan

Ivan,

Have just looked at ALL your wonderful, hard work on putting all the LP, CD and cassette covers into the discography and am blown away. It really is fantastic to see all of them together and how many variations were used over the years. Thank you so much for taking a huge amount of time to do this and to allow us all to see it. I am going to get a very good friend of mine to look at it as he may have some material to add - he introduced me to the music of PL live in 1977 at the Palladium and has collected forever as I subsequently have as well.

It really is marvellous of you to do this and on a grey Monday morning in January it lifts my spirits to see all these beautiful pictures of Peggy.

Many, many thanks

George

George, your message was VERY appreciated. It certainly raises my enthusiasm and my desire to continue with this project. (Loved your last, picturesque sentence in particular.) A whole lot of thanks to you and, again, to previous posters.

And yes, if you (George) or your friend or any of you guys have access to any album pics that I might be missing, and if you can scan and send them by email, that would be great. (Exception: photos of compilations and "greatest hits" packages. I have a lot of those; I just haven't worked on that section of this project yet.)

I'm particularly keen on finding scans for the Peggy Lee albums (LPs, EPs) released by Festival Records in New Zealand or Australia. Right now, I think I have pics for only one Festival album, yet I have 13 Festival issues listed in the discography ... My Holy Grail is the Festival version of the album "Dream Street," which I saw years ago. It interests me the most because it is a curiosity: the third fairly different version of the same original artwork.

Finally, I have neglected to mention that the previously announced pages have been ready for a while. Here we go...

EPs: [peggyleediscography.com]

Twofers: [peggyleediscography.com]

Collaborations with Benny Goodman: [peggyleediscography.com]

And I have made a handful of additions to the previously opened pages.

Up next: photo pages dedicated to albums containing (a) Peggy's radio performances and (b) her collaborations with Bing Crosby.

Ivan

A page dedicated to Peggy's collaborations with Bing Crosby -- in the studio -- is now open:

[peggyleediscography.com]

This is a short page -- kind of a supplement to the Decca page.

Again, only studio recordings are covered. As for Peggy's radio work with Bing, it will be included in the radio page on which I'm working right now.

Ivan

Two additional pages are now finished:

[peggyleediscography.com]

[peggyleediscography.com]

Both pages deal with Peggy's work on radio. The first one should be of special interest to those of us who want to collect everything that Peggy recorded. Lots of rarities listed.

On my end, that page turned out to be the hardest one to prepare, chiefly because the radio material was "virgin territory" for me. (Unlike the items listed in the other pages, those radio albums had not been previously organized or entered in the discography.) On the other hand, this was the most interesting one to put together, for the same reason (i.e., my lack of previous full acquaintance with this material).

Up next:

television and video material

guest appearances on other artists' albums

Ivan

Thanks Ivan,

About Al Jolson Peggy Lee "At Their Rarest of All Rare Performances." One LP on Peggy. Sleeve indicates BRAD 10530 as the Peggy LP but on the LP itself It's BRAD 10531.

Track list side 1

1. Sunshine Lake, according to sleeve. Sunshine Kake on LP. No cake around...
2. 1000 Violins
3. When I'm Back Home (indeed Way Back Home)
Above 3 songs duets with Bing Crosby, dated (day/month/year) 08-02/1950
4. Dream Is a Wish. Peggy sings solo on same date as above and is introduced (probably by Crosby) saying something like "the new Walt Disney picture CINDERELLA bla bla bla (mumbles to me) Peggy Lee wants to do a ballad for you now".
5. You'll Right Baby, 19-09-1945 (indeed You Was Right Baby).

Side 2

1.Can't Help Lovin' That Man. 1949, no day or month. Peggy introduces the song as follows. "Here's a song Helen Morgan introduced in Show Boat, remember?"
2. Lily Bolero, 07-07-1948
3. A Hundred Years from Today,
4. Them Their Eyes (yes, Them There Eyes)
5. Waltz in Swingtime. Here info reads Peggy Lee-Dave Barbour. No vocals though...

These last 3 songs are dated !7-10-1948. There is no mention of songwriters anywhere. Sound quality poor, especially on Side 1 track 5. Sometimes reasonable. But it's also clear that Peggy is in great form in these performances. side 2 track 1 ends almost belting to great effect and side 2 track 3 is tender and dreamy, I love it.

Greetings from Theo.

Oh yes, I forgot to mention that the Jolson dates are all from 1947, so there is no apparent connection with Peggy's LP.

Thank you very much for the very helpful information about that rare LP, Theo.

From your detailed account, I can gather that the first 4 tracks are from Bing Crosby's radio show.

The other tracks seem to be from a variety of radio shows, too. I will have to wait until I'm back home to check. The dates that you've supplied will probably be of great help.

The biggest mystery for me was "Waltz in Swingtime." I'm disappointed to learn that it is an instrumental, even though I suspected (feared) that such would be the case. Oh well.

I have definitely listened to that radio performance of "A Hundred Years from Today." It's among my favorite Peggy numbers from the 1940s. The source is an Armed Forces radio show in which Peggy and Dave guested ("Guest Star," I think). There is another of those Guest Star shows in which they do a version of "Goodbye, John" which is even better (more emotional and declamatory) than the Capitol recording...

Thanks once more, Theo.

Ivan

Just FYI. Finally I have finished updating 12 pages of album photos. They are at

[peggyleediscography.com]

[Location: blue bar, where it says "Photos."]

There are new added photos on every page. Among the additions: images of a few Capitol reel-to-reel and 8-track cartridges.

That's not all there is. Many more photo pages are still to come. Currently I am working on pages about Peggy's guest TV appearances and Snaders telescriptions. I hope to have those ready next week.

Something else that is new to the discography: a few pages dedicated to information about 5 of Peggy's most famous numbers. For instance, this page is about "Mañana":

[peggyleediscography.com]

[Location: blue bar, "Miscellanea."]


Ivan

The following new pages try to cover every TV appearance that has been commercially released, and should thus be of particular interest to many of us fans:

[peggyleediscography.com]
(Peggy's commercially issued guest appearances from TV variety shows)

[peggyleediscography.com]
(Snaders telescriptions, music shorts, etc.)

[peggyleediscography.com]
(Peggy's commercially issued specials, concerts, documentaries, etc.)

The first of these three pages was more of a challenge, in part because it was my first time covering all this TV stuff in detail. For the same reason, it has been the most interesting page for me to put together, so far. (It took a long time, that's for sure!) If you can think of anything else that I might have left unmentioned in that page (or in any others), please let me know.

Next: photo pages about Peggy's work on film.

Ivan

Ivan, very interesting stuff to read! Thanks and I'm looking forward to the next pages.

Richard, Holland.

You are welcome, Richard, and thank you, too. In complete agreement about how interesting this stuff can be!

I just finished 3 more pages. These are dedicated to Peggy's work on film.

[peggyleediscography.com]
Peggy's contributions to animated movies (Walt Disney's Lady and the Tramp is not all there is!)

[peggyleediscography.com]
Peggy's contributions to movie soundtracks (from About Mrs. Leslie to Sharky's Machine)

[peggyleediscography.com]
Peggy's appearances on film (including not only Hollywood flicks but also TV movies)

And with that, I am finished with the most challenging and interesting part of this pictorial project (i.e., film, television, and radio). Next: albums of a rather supplementary nature, including compilations or anthologies.

Ivan

Thanks for the informative updates, which inspired me, among other things, to watch tom thumb once again.

It is a pity that Peggy Lee did not record Are You A Dream for commercial release; it is a song that can stand on its own (while tom thumb's Tune works well as a theme song but would have little appea beyond the context of the movie, at least as a vocal track, unless it was given a more substantial set of lyrics).

Does the estate have a demo copy of Are You A Dream that might be fit for inclusion in a "behind-the-scenes" documentary DVD or CD, perhaps coupled with other outtakes or incorporated in an album of songs written and performed by Peggy Lee?

The estate should consider issuing additional volumes of material to augment what Peggy Lee was doing herself in creating The Peggy Lee Songbook/There'll Be Another Spring in 1990. It would be a way of establishing her credentials as a multi-faceted artist, would enhance potential music-buyers appreciation of her talents and could help ensure that other singers would include material from her catalog in concert or on upcoming recordings.

Kevin, I greatly appreciate your comment about re-watching tom thumb after noticing its inclusion in the discographical pages. It makes me feel that the time and effort put into this project is all the more worthwhile.

It would indeed be nice if there was an extant tape of "Are You a Dream" sung by Peggy herself. Although I have never heard of any such tape, I have to assume that she sang most of the things that she wrote, even if she didn't record them. In a case such as this one, I would think that she might have made a demo of the song, which would have been given to the film's music production department and/or to the movie's singer...

Well, as mentioned in my previous post, I have now moved on to the preparation of miscellaneous discographical pages. Truth be told, these should be of only marginal interest to us, Peggy Lee fans. Still, they do have interesting tidbits here and there.

The new pages cover multiple-artists compilations and Peggy's guest appearances in other artists' albums:

[peggyleediscography.com]

[peggyleediscography.com]

For those of us who are fans of the Great American Songbook and its writers, the first page offers what I believe to be one of the aforementioned tidbits of note: photos of all the volumes in the Smithsonian's "American Songbook Series," irrespective of whether the volume includes or excludes Peggy Lee. Ditto for a similar but far smaller series of volumes which Rhino released nearly 20 years ago. The entries for both series are found toward the bottom of the page.

As for the other page, you might or might have not seen the two photos of Peggy therein, one of them in the company of Benny Carter, and the other in the company of Michael Franks.

Up next: many more various-artists compilations, these ones from the EMI-Capitol family of labels.

Ivan

Ivan, what a treat you have prepared for us yet again! It is astonishing that you are aware of so many obscure albums; you truly are a treasure trove of information!

The covers were fascinating for at least three reasons: they offer a historic look at what was considered to be marketable artwork at various times; they suggest what songs the compilation producers thought were Peggy's most important/interesting recordings; and they present a wide-ranging roster of performers with whom the producers felt Peggy had some compatibility. (Undoubtedly, the producers were limited by licensing agreements and so on, but nonetheless, it is good seeing that so many different project managers decided to include Peggy's work; she recorded an extraordinary body of top-rate material, and these sets may awaken more people to her artistry.)

In addition, of course, seeing certain of the collections heightened my itch to spend. Yes, I have all of the Peggy Lee tracks (except Ja-Da) identified in each of the sets already, but hearing them individually, mixed among the less-familiar or unknown tracks by other performers, might cause me to appreciate Peggy's recordings in a new context. But I'm fighting to resist the urge to buy!

Thank you, Kevin, for pointing out the various ways in which compilations can prove valuable. In full agreement. And here's hoping that you can treat yourself to quite a few compilation purchases, with Peggy's numbers among the selected tracks (if not right away, then for the upcoming holiday period)! ...
____________________________________

Now ready for viewing: the first of various pages dedicated to various-artists compilations from the Capitol family of labels. Some appealing album artwork there -- especially from the Blue Note label. Also, a few curiosities or rarities, including 78 albums.

[peggyleediscography.com]

Ivan

In the last few days, I have added to the discography 4 new pages of album photos. All 4 pages are dedicated to various-artists compilations from Capitol-EMI and its branches. Details below.

1. [peggyleediscography.com]

This page covers EMI's compact disc series. CDs such as Capitol Sings Irving Berlin, Capitol Sings Duke Ellington and High Rollers! From Las Vegas are all featured herein, along with other items from the same series to which such discs belong. Among the other CD series also discussed in this page: Wild, Cool & Swingin', Ultra Lounge, and The Best Album... Ever!

2. [peggyleediscography.com]

This page covers Capitol's series on vinyl. If your familiarity with Peggy's music goes back to the LP era, and if you remember getting albums from labels such as Capitol Special Products (e.g., The Best Of The Great Hit Songs, The Great Hits From Stage And Screen...), this page could bring back further memories for you. Also in: appendixes discussing Capitol Special Markets, Capitol's record club, and Zenith's custom-made albums.

3. [peggyleediscography.com]

A page focused on promotional and/or radio LPs in which Peggy Lee tracks can be found. If you are curious about albums with titles such as The Capitol Disc Jockey Album or Silver Platter Service, this page may be worth your while.

4. [peggyleediscography.com]

Well, I'm as bad as the whole world of commerce: I'm bringing up Christmas when we've barely gotten through Halloween! This page is dedicated to holiday issues (both LPs and CDs) that contain Peggy Lee tracks.
________

Next up, a more manageable topic: instead of various-artists compilations, Peggy Lee-only compilations and hits packages. I'll start with her compilations from the Decca-MCA family.

Ivan

Now ready for viewing: the page dedicated to Peggy Lee compilations containing Decca masters. You can take a look at

[peggyleediscography.com]

HELP REQUESTED: I am aware of many other LP and CD compilations, especially from Japan, that could be added to this page. Sadly, I do not have photos of them, and hence I have not been able to incorporate them. If you have images of those albums, and if you can post them here (at peggylee.com ) or attach them to an email (sent to ivansantiagomercado@earthlink.net ), that would be great.

To be more specific, here is what I'm looking for: LPs and CDs released by

a) Decca, MCA, Victor, Columbia in Spain, or Brunswick

that are

b) compilations (not original albums)

and

c) whose images are not included in the page linked above, of course.
_______

Next page, currently in preparation: Peggy Lee compilations released by Capitol-EMI and its licensees.

Ivan

Ivan:

Perhaps this can resolve the mystery you alluded to in discussing "The Best Of Peggy Lee." The 1960/1980 question could stem from a typo on the record labels.

My copy of the "enhanced for stereo" gatefold album, purchased in 1971/1972, has the original front cover art with the blue stripe (and the Decca name) but contains records with the MCA rainbow label.

Curved around the bottom of the labels, the trademark line does indicate a 1980 copyright date. At first, I thought that because the type is small and the font has circle-like figures, perhaps the number was a six, rather than an eight, but after slightly more careful scrutiny, I noticed the ZIP code (91608) at the other end of the copyright line, and there was just enough of a break in the top loop of the six to confirm that the copyright year is printed, clearly, as "1980."

There is no date printed on the jacket itself, which has a front cover like #3 of your images, with, again, the "Decca" name, not the MCA name as shown in image #4. (The blue tones, incidentally, are slightly darker than those shown in your images, with the blue at the bottom closer to that shown behind several of the drop-out letters in image #1.) The back cover has been modified from the original (mono) 1960 version shown as #2; the blue band stretches across the top of the jacket, and about a half-inch above the "PEGGY LEE" band at the bottom, there is an additional line in black reading, "DECCA RECORDS, A Division of MCA Inc."

Curiously, the jacket has the DXSB 7164 number in the upper left corner and on the spine, while the records themselves, again with the MCA rainbow label, have the MCA2-2049 number, and beneath that, in a smaller font, the number 7-7875* appears. Presumably this asterisk relates to the one listed in both the sub-title at the top of the label and the one positioned after several song titles. That asterisk is introduced in the title and sub-title lines at the top of the label as follows:

"THE BEST OF PEGGY LEE
With Orchestrations Directed By
Sy Oliver* Victor Young** Sonny Burke***

On a final note, while the jacket of my album is quite similar to your image #3, it has "enhanced for STEREO" printed in black letters directly on the blue band in the upper right corner rather than a white sticker with "Simulated Stereo" as shown.

Hallo Iván!

I have some CDs here that I not have seen here. I must get time to scan them but I have much to do just now with my groups. You are very welcome to Facebook too. I think the most all here even are on Facebook. Very welcome Iván.

Best wishes to you ALL!

Jarl