Julie Andrews

Sony Spain's CD two-fer combines two albums Julie Andrews released originally on Columbia Records in 1962, Broadway's Fair Julie and Don't Go in the Lion's Cage Tonight (or, as it was titled in some territories, Spain among them, Heartrending Ballads & Raucous Ditties). Although they were recorded in sequence, these were very different albums taking very different approaches. Broadway's Fair Julie was the kind of record you might expect from the female star of +Camelot, a collection of 12 ballads drawn from Broadway shows, including standards like "Baubles, Bangles and Beads" (+Kismet) and "How Are Things in Glocca Morra?" (+Finian's Rainbow). Proper Englishwoman Andrews rendered such material effectively in her warm voice with its precise intonation. She was a bit less effective taking on character songs that were beyond the usual for her, such as "A Sleepin' Bee" from +House of Flowers, but, especially on the more obscure tracks, she shone. Don't Go in the Lion's Cage Tonight revealed a whole other side of her, the kind of songs her Eliza Doolittle in +My Fair Lady might have heard in English music halls in the early years of the 20th century. Andrews broke out her Cockney accent here and there, but always performed these comic numbers with humorous affection. A barbershop quartet sometimes accompanied her, but even on her own she was a delight recalling the early works of Irving Berlin ("Alexander's Ragtime Band," "Everybody's Doin' It Now") as well as character songs like "Burlington Bertie From Bow," which she later performed in the Gertrude Lawrence film biography Star! When you put these two albums together on one disc, the mood shifts radically at track 13, but the combined album provides a well-rounded look at a major talent in her prime. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide