Album Notes

This is Dewey Erney's 11th CD which once again features the best of the Great American Songbook. Where there are many singers now interpreting the riches found in these wonderful songs, Dewey actually pays homage to this material by letting you hear the melody and the lyrics while doing it in a conversational style in a most swinging fashion. He is in a sense updating the songs in a way reminiscent of Sinatra, Cole, Torme, Bennett, etc. This is not easily found today. So enjoy this and all of Dewey's recordings while you can, because he certainly is the end of an era. This is not to say that he sounds old-fashioned and corny. To the contrary, these interpretations are very fresh. The difference in this recording is that this was recorded 'live' at the famous Southern California jazz spot, Steamers Jazz Club in Fullerton. Dewey has appeared there on the 4th Thursday of every month for the past 8 years. The beauty of this particular recording is that this is not a "best of" several nights of recording to garner enough "good stuff" for a CD, this was all recorded on one evening (March 27, 2003) and, as you hear it, that these songs were all recorded without stops and starts and redoing of songs to get a better take. In fact, there's about 40 more minutes of material not included on this CD that is perfectly useable for a recording but because of time constraints, they weren't used at this time. As it is, the recording is over 67 minutes. Please enjoy this CD; it comes from the heart and shows the rare vocal talent of Dewey Erney and the master musicians with him - Gerry Schroeder on piano, Jack Prather on bass, Kendall Kay on drums and the great Ron Stout on trumpet. Buy it. You won't be sorry. Be sure to check out Dewey's other recordings which are also available at CD Baby.