A Centennial Anthology of Decca Recordings

Crosby, Bing

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Bing: Not Just for White Christmas Anymore

"The thing you have to understand about Bing Crosby," the jazz clarinetist and bandleader Artie Shaw once said, is that he was "the first hip white person born in the United States."

That's hard to fathom now. Crosby (1903–1977) is the picture next to the word "milquetoast" in the modern dictionary, a singer whose overriding feyness is remembered more than his agile baritone, whose association with a tame age of popular music overshadows the fact that he phrased with a jazz musician's control of nuance. That's what Shaw was responding to: Instrumentalists listened closely to Crosby, because unlike just about every other singer of the 1930s, the proto-crooner from Spokane, Washington, came across as one cool customer, forever relaxed. He was one of the first recording artists to communicate subtlety on tape, to not merely sing a song but impart a mood.

This excellent two-disc overview of Crosby's peak career years is full of those moods—thoughtful renditions of standards, ballads that melt into thin air. To lose your Crosby preconceptions, cue up one of his early soundtrack performances, "Pennies from Heaven." Though he's supported by a huge orchestra, Crosby outlines a very slight pulse, setting a pace that is subtle yet unfailingly steady. His verses have a musing way about them, and later, at the point where the song crests, Crosby doesn't pour on extra emotion. Instead, he hums a bit of the tune, endearingly, as though envisioning a trailing shot in a film. There are plenty of other selections—from the perennial "White Christmas" to offbeat island exotica ("Blue Hawaii") to songs celebrating a carefree life ("I've Got a Pocketful of Dreams")—that could, in a moment of generous revisionism, bolster Bing's hipness quotient. But when you really listen to this graceful singer, it's clear he didn't care about hipness. The truly hip never do.

Genre: Vocals
Released: 2003, Decca/MCA
Key Tracks: "Stardust," "Pennies from Heaven," "Blue Skies," "White Christmas," "I've Got a Pocketful of Dreams."
F.Y.I.: Crosby had thirty-eight #1 hits, more than the Beatles (twenty-four) and Elvis Presley (eighteen).
Catalog Choice: Bing Sings Whilst Bregman Swings; Fancy Meeting You Here (with Rosemary Clooney)
Next Stop: Frank Sinatra: Swingin' Session!
After That: Madeline Peyroux: Careless Love
Book Pages: 194–195