4 comments about Christmas with Vince Gill.

1. ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL. TYPICAL VINCE. - REALLY PUTS YOU IN THE CHRISTMAS MOOD. I LOVE TO WATCH IT EVERY CHRISTMAS



2. ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL. TYPICAL VINCE. - REALLY PUTS YOU IN THE CHRISTMAS MOOD. I LOVE TO WATCH IT EVERY CHRISTMAS



3. I watched this for the first time this afternoon (Christmas Eve) and found it amazing. Too bad it is not available in DVD. Vince is at his best, along with Amy Grant, Chet Atkins, the Tulsa Philharmonic, the Oral Roberts University Chapel Choir and others. Seeing it along with hearing the music adds to the enjoyment of these treasured traditional Christmas songs.



4. This is a beautiful video. I love every minute of it. I am now buying it for a friend who saw Vince in concert and fell in love with him!!

5 comments about Lady Day - The Many Faces of Billie Holiday.

1. This Billie Holiday album was like a ray of light to me when I first listened to it! It's so inspiring! You can see why so many artists of today are influenced by it! The music really took me to the borderline. I thank my lucky star that this album came along.



2. If you are interested in the (ever fashionable) approach to Jazz, via the contemporary interpretation of the social environment in which the Jazz artists created, then there is a good chance you may like this DVD.

   However, if real footage is what you are after, this DVD may well disappoint you too. In this latter case I strongly suggest you spend your money on "The Ladies Sing the Blues" DVD.

   Being interested in a combination of real footage and adept commentary I got disappointed on both ends. In the whole DVD, there are at most three incomplete songs where Lady Day actually sings, yet there are a few too many (poor taste) instances when her voiced dubs some disconnected Jazz players/dancers. As well, in addition to some general socio-historical vignettes, I found the commentary to be just a suite of encomiums with no critical side to it.




3. This documentary, released concurrently with a hard-cover book of the same name in 1991, is a brief but highly accurate overview of the life and art of Billie Holiday. The book, with text by Robert O'Meally, contains literally hundreds of rare photographs, and a good deal of these are liberally sprinkled throughout the film. But ultimately, it is the sparsely produced but flawlessly executed narrative of her life and craft that make this DVD stand out among the few biographical pieces that have been released about the great Lady Day.
   
   The film contains interviews with several of Billie's closest friends and the musicians who worked with her. The insight provided by fellow jazz-singers and friends Carmen McRae and Annie Ross is indeed enlightening, but it is the observances of her fellow musicians, Mal Waldron, Buck Clayton and Harry "Sweets" Edison, as well as particularly eloquent comments by writer and jazz historian Albert Murray, that make this documentary particularly illuminating. There are snatches of Billie's greatest recordings, which consist of excerpts that illustrate exactly what was so unique about Lady's genius, often accompanied by explanations of what made her music so important, or perfectly timed clips of jazz audiences and dancers of the day, reveling in the music. At one point, trumpet player Harry Edison remarks that Billie was a jazz musician, in the way that she used her voice and, "attacked the words and could swing just like a trumpet player". His comment is immediately followed by a brief clip of her 1936 recording of "I Can't Give you Anything But Love" (with Teddy Wilson and his band) in which she exactly emulates the sound of that instrument with her voice. Albert Murray and Sweets Edison carefully explain, once and for all, that Billie was not a blues singer, but a jazz singer - the very best jazz singer, while Buck Clayton, Carmen McRae and Mal Waldron clarify that Billie was the first vocalist to use her voice dramatically, change the melody and phrasing of songs to fit her mood, and improvise on written music to create a form of art that was as original as it was unique. They make you understand that Billie Holiday literally influenced every singer that came after her; this film makes it possible for someone with little prior knowledge of her, or her craft, to understand exactly why she was such an important and influential figure in both popular music and jazz singing. Simply put, Billie Holiday changed the way singers sang songs, and this film articulates this fact with vivid clarity.
   
   The film goes out of its way (as does the book) to correct some of the more glaring inaccuracies in her biography, and does not flinch from the somewhat sordid and sensational details of her tragically short and pain-filled life. At the same time, the portrait is one of someone who certainly did enjoy their life to the fullest despite tragedy, and Billie is revealed as the basically happy and cheerful (if often abused) person that she really was. Throughout we hear actress Ruby Dee read some of the more accurate portions of Billie's "autobiography" - Lady Sings the Blues, a book she didn't write, and probably never even read.
   
   Also worthy of note are the contributions of producer Milt Gabler, who relates the story behind Billie's biggest hit, "Lover Man", which he produced for Decca Records in 1944. There is also a well-orchestrated and effective buildup to the song "Strange Fruit", the social and political aspects of which are carefully explained by Milt Gabler (who labels it, "the first important protest song"). He relates that Columbia Records refused to record it, for fear of "bad press and boycotts" by their Southern dealers. Annie Ross says, "I knew it was banned, and I knew WHY it was banned", while Carmen McRae simply states, "that was just straight up facts, you know, the way it was in those days" while they all express their admiration for Billie and her brave stance as an African American, who dared to sing a song about lynching in the pre-civil rights era of 1939. The discussion is followed by a late clip of Billie, looking absolutely radiant, singing the song before a television audience, while accompanied by Mal Waldron on piano. The expressions and drama etched on her face while she runs through the powerful lyrics, ("Southern trees bear a strange fruit, blood on the leaves, and blood at the root; black bodies swinging in the southern breeze, strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees") right through the dramatic climax, ("...for the sun to rot, for the tree to drop, here is a strange and bitter crop") make this video a potent testament to her amazing valor and artistic perfection.
   
   There are other rare and wonderful (if much too brief) video clips of Billie Holiday at her best, and sometimes, at the stark and shocking end of her life. One clip begins with a particularly sickly, ghostly looking Billie, her appearance nothing less than alarming, but as the clip progresses we realize that poor video quality, combined with an unflattering camera angle and bad lighting, make her look far worse than she really did. A moment later the camera switches angles, and with relief we see that she is far more elegant and healthy-looking than she appears at the onset of the clip.
   
   We also get brief scenes of her only film, New Orleans, with Louis Armstrong, made in 1947. While Billie sings the song "The Blues Are Brewin'", the close-ups give us a rare glimpse into what it must have been like to experience the real Billie Holiday; she sings the words, "...suppose you want somebody, but you ain't got nobody, you only got a gleam in your eye...", and her expressions are absolutely brilliant. There is not only a gleam in her eye, there is a wrinkle in her brow, a lilt in her gestures and contractions in her facial muscles that, all combined, communicate a range of feeling and a show of expression that lesser singers could never hope to convey. Priceless.
   
   The climax of the film is the celebrated clip of her singing her composition, "Fine and Mellow" from the famous 1956 television special, The Voice of Jazz. Accompanied by several of her peers in the jazz world, including Ben Webster, Lester Young, Roy Eldridge and Gerry Mulligan, the cameraman wisely chose to concentrate on Billie's face, even as the soloists took their individual turns, and we get a delightful look of Billie playfully nodding her head in time with the beat, appreciation for the talents of her fellow musicians clearly showing in her eyes and motions.
   
   Some viewers have expressed disappointment by the fact that more video clips of Billie are not presented here, forgetting that (unfortunately) there are very few video records remaining of her performances. I believe I have now seen, through this and the other available videos, most of her surviving video performances, and this film does contain some of the very best of them. But the inclusion of those few precious video clips notwithstanding, it is the explanation of Billie's art and the clear articulation of her genius that make this documentary so gratifying.
   
   As the film closes on the story of her life, Albert Murray comments that, in the end, it is, "the eloquence, the universality of her statement that matters" most, while Carmen McRae reflects that, although much of Billie's voice was gone by the time she recorded "Lady in Satin", there was something about her voice, even then, that could evoke intense feeling, and Miss McRae says she still plays that album, and cries. Over the credits, we hear a few bars of "I'm A Fool To Want You" from Lady in Satin, and we instantly know exactly why Carmen McRae found it so moving.
   
   Highly recommended.



4. It is great to have a digital standard bio of such a great Lady...



5. This is the first music of Billie Holiday's that I have ever bought. It was beautiful, and I will treasure this CD always. She is such a singer that pulls at your heartstrings as you listen.

No comments about Hip Hop Legends.

No comments about Academy Award's Best, #1 ~ Ten (10) Dvd Gift Collection: ~ Gone With the Wind ~ Casablanca ~ Roman Holiday ~ The King and I ~ Waterloo Bridge ~ From Here To Eternity ~ For Whom the Bell Tolls ~ Guys and Dolls ~ A Farewell To Arms ~ War and Peace [Import](All-region).

2 comments about Mannheim Steamroller - A Renaissance Christmas.

1. THIS IS A VERY INTERESTING VIDEO ABOUT CHRISTMAS DURING THE
   RENAISSANCE. FEW OF US ARE AWARE OF THE DIFFERENT SONGS AND
   CUSTOMS OF CHRISTMAS DURING THIS PERIOD. CHIP DAVIS AND MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER PRODUCE A WONDERLAND OF BOTH EDUCATIONAL AND
   TOTALLY ENJOYABLE MUSIC. THE SIGHTS AND SOUNDS OF THIS VIDEO
   ARE A MUST FOR ANYONE WHO TRULY LOVES EVERYTHING ABOUT CHRISTMAS.



2. Anyone who has an interest in the Renaissance period will enjoy this musical video with it's re-enactment of a Christmas Renaissance feast. It features performers who entertain the table guests, such as jugglers, dancers, and more, all set to old world carols. The music is breathtakingly beautiful, as anyone who loves Mannheim Steamroller can attest to. This is a magnificent production and we watch it every Christmas. I highly recommend it!

4 comments about Classic Christmas.

1. Anne's voice never sounded better and it's a delight to see and hear the talents of Canadian Roch Voisine (who's phenomenal voice sounds like Jim Croce) and Barenaked Ladies. With lush scenery of Toronto landmark The Old Mill as the backdrop, there's plenty of music (and two performances of Elvis Stojko) to keep young and old happy. Despite some trite dialogue with the guests on this special, the musical highlights include the gospel-sounding "No Room at the Inn," and, quite surpisingly, the inspired harmony of Anne singing with her husband, son, and daughter. Who knew!?! A MUST for Anne Murray fans and those who appreciate gifted voices and harmony.



2. Anne Murray, The Barenaked Ladies, Rock Voisine, and her family join you in an hour of singing carols and rejoicing in the Christmas Spirit. A Christmas like no other, it will bring your spirits of Christmas right along with you, and once again Anne Murray has succeeded in bringing her voice into your heart and making your soul sing along.



3. The richness of her voice and the warmth of her style make you feel that Anne Murray is having this Christmas gathering just for you.
   
   The beautiful setting lends itself to holiday photography and there is excellent sound on this DVD. While the jacket lists one of her guests as "international sensation Roch Voisine," I never heard of this Canadian favorite. Now that I have heard him, I'll be looking for more of his work. Roch introduces a song he wrote just for this party, CHRISTMAS IS CALLING. His guitar work is outstanding. Anne and Roch follow with an unusual medley WE THREE KINGS, THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY, THE STORY OF THE THREE BELLS (about Little Jimmy Brown) and DECK THE HALLS. Their voices blend beautifully. It would be a treat to hear more of their duets on another Christmas special. It's worth the price of the DVD just to hear these stars sing together.
   
   Two ice rink segments feature champion skater Elvis Stojko and there's a segment where Anne sings with the pop rock group Barenaked Ladies. There are plenty of old standards but it's nice to have some contemporary Christmas songs, too. THIS SEASON WILL NEVER GROW OLD with words and music by Canada's Rita MacNeil is now on my list of contemporary favorites. It's a joy to have Anne's voice fill my home with this song along with all the others on this program.



4. Anne Murray sait comment nous faire rêver avec ce spécial de Noël. Des classiques de Noël interprétés comme seule elle sait le faire. Je le redécouvre année après année.

No comments about The Little Christmas Burro and Other Christmas Favorites.

No comments about Tooth.

1 comments about Lonely Planet Six Degrees Series 2: London.

1. This is not what I expected. It is like those six degrees of separation shows where one person encounters another person, etc. It should not be listed as a travel guide at all. It's more about these quirky people than it is about London. We wanted a travel guide that highlighted places not to miss. This is full of weird little places only people who live there would ever go to. Very disappointing.

No comments about Drew's Famous Scream Scenes and Scary Sounds: Cursed.