Personnel:
Dick Nash (tb), Ronnie Lang (bs, as, fl), Ted Nash (as), Vince DeRosa (frh), Johnny Williams (p), Vic Feldman (vib, marimba), Bob Bain (g), Shelly Manne (d)
Reference: BMCD 1628
Bar code: 8427328016285
The Mancini Touch, like swing, is something hard to define but easy to recognize. Put the two together and you get a swinging touch like nothing youve ever heard. You can hear it... and its worth listening to. You can feel it... and its worth dancing to. Its The Mancini Touch.
"This '59 RCA Living Stereo re-issue ranks among the very finest of Mancini's title albums. Not to be confused with "Touch of Evil", "Mancini Touch" offers sweet catchy Jazz polished with strings. Like Artie Shaw and Charlie Parker before him, Mancini engineers just the right amount of said strings for sweetness and avoiding the sacharine. Beautifully recorded, this CD offers a number of covers including Ralph Burns' "Bijou" (covered also by Woody Herman) and Claude Thornhill's "Snowfall". A must for any Mancini Fan."
-Amazon.com
"An entry in RCA's Living Stereo series, The Mancini Touch is said to be Henry Mancini's attempt to combine "modern jazz ideas" with big-band swing. The result is a carefully arranged album [...] Mancini wrote "Free and Easy" for the Sal Mineo film "Rock, Pretty Baby," which speaks to his popular focus in spite of the jazz trappings. Some numbers are moody and not at all dance-oriented, such as "Snowfall," a meditation on acoustic guitar and vibes that grows into a subtle swell of soft strings and horns. "Bijou" is a whimsical piece that anticipates the sound of "Baby Elephant Walk" and "The Pink Panther Theme."
Greg Adams -All Music Guide
