How the mighty hath fallen! Virgin Classics' The Swingle Singers is a reissue of something originally put together in 1991 around the time of The Swingle Singers Around the World. This is the English edition of the Swingles, not the French group featuring Christiane Legrand, which broke up in 1973. Afterward, leader Ward Swingle relocated to London to create an English version of the group, but he was long gone by the time these recordings were made. Although this Virgin package may look like it's a greatest-hits collection, don't be fooled -- it's an in-concert recording, with applause after every track, and the super skimpy budget package does not even confide in us as to the where and when of the concert. This edition of the
Swingle Singers sounds like something that might fall in between
Chanticleer when they are trying to sing black Gospel (or something else they shouldn't be doing) and the
Manhattan Transfer. You wonder why Virgin would credit
Henry Mancini's Peter Gunn to "Traditional." Had he heard it,
Mancini probably would have been thankful to see it so credited; once you hear it, you will wonder, "What were they thinking?"
The French group recorded exclusively for Philips, and that makes the recordings rather easy to distinguish from others, and some of the earlier albums by the English edition of the group may well be worth seeking out. But not this one; it is Swingles avec dilué. It isn't even well recorded.