Playing the Field is a studio album by Mark Murphy.
Playing the Field is the fifth album by American jazz vocalist Mark Murphy and his third for Capitol Records. It was recorded in 1960, when Murphy was 28 years old, and released by the Capitol Records label in the United States in 1960. The album is a collection of pop tunes and standards performed with a jazz band.
Background
Capitol Records producer Tom Morgan signed Murphy to a three-album contract when Murphy was on the West Coast in 1958 on the basis of the two albums he recorded for Milt Gabler of Decca Records.[1][2] This release was his final album for Capitol. Although none of his Capitol records were as commercially successful as Murphy and his label had hoped, they marked the beginning of a long, interesting and influential career.
Recording
The arrangements for this release were done by Bill Holman. Holman had arranged his prior Capitol releases.[3][2] The recordings are divided between small band and trio arrangements.
Ellington's "I Didn't Know About You" was a song Murphy heard Nicky DeFrancis perform at "Jilly" Rizzo's 52nd street bar Jilly's Saloon. Murphy said, "He was fantastic – played like Erroll Garner and sang like the Italian singers in Philadelphia, where he was from. He did the hippest tunes in New York at that time, like "I Guess I'll Hang My Tears Out to Dry" and "I Didn't Know About You". If you asked for them, everyone knew you were hip. That's why they sometimes appeared in my records".[3]
Buddy DeSylva's "Wishing (Will Make It So)" is from 1939's Love Affair co-starring Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne. "Put the Blame on Mame" is a song featured in the 1946 film noirGilda in which Rita Hayworthlip synched to Anita Ellis' vocal recording. Apparently it was a Murphy favorite and he adds a few original lines.[3] Murphy and Producer Tom Morgan thought it had potential to be a hit single but Capitol declined to release and promote it as a single. Murphy said, "By that time they had given up on me. They released the album and said Goodbye".[3]
Colin Larkin assigns the record 3 stars in The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music.[5] Three stars means, "Good. By the artist's usual standards and therefore recommended".[5] He wrote, "the appearance of several albums in the late 50s announced that the jazz world had a new and important singer in its midst".[5]
Murphy biographer Peter Jones says the album "was probably his worst to date, with several sub-two minute tracks, presumably in hopes of some easy radio play. The mood is relentlessly upbeat, but much of the material is forgettable, and there is too much insincere showbiz sparkle and showing off . . . From the laddish title to the cover, Murphy was again being sold as a babe-magnet-cum-man-about-town, depicted in various sophisticated poses with four different females."[2] Jones points out that Murphy had grown up with bebop and swing, but was trying to achieve stardom in the mainstream commercial record market. "That seemed to mean presenting himself as a young hipster, a swinging cool dude around town, toying with the affections of innumerable women, and having a whale of a time". Jones wrote, "The one thing Murphy hadn't yet tried was just being himself".[2]
Will Friedwald said that the albums made during this period from 1956 to 1960 "reveal a young singer with a strong, dark, attractive voice, with a lot of good ideas and an obvious commitment to the jazz idiom-but one who stops just short of having a sound and a style of his own".[1] Friedwald wrote, "As Murphy himself noted, the audience for these songs just wasn't his, and vice versa-even though he succeeded in doing something aesthetically interesting and indeed hip with material that no one would have thought could lend itself to such a treatment".[1]
Frank Rosolino, Lou McCreary, Bob Fitzpatrick – trombone
Production
Unknown – engineer, recorded in Los Angeles, July 5 and 7, 1960
Tom Morgan – producer
References
^ abcFriedwald, Will (2010). A Biographical Guide to the Great Jazz and Pop Singers (Kindle ed.). New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. p. 348. ISBN978-0-375-42149-5.
^ abcdefJones, Peter (2018). This is hip: the life of Mark Murphy. Popular music history. Sheffield, UK ; Bristol, CT: Equinox Publishing. pp. 29–30. ISBN978-1-78179-473-9.
^ abcdeGavin, James. (1997). The Best of Mark Murphy The Capitol Years. (Liner notes). Mark Murphy. Capitol Records.
^ abcdLarkin, Colin (2002). The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Colin Larkin, Muze UK Ltd (eds.) (Concise 4th ed.). London: Virgin. pp. 899–900. ISBN978-1-85227-923-3.
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