Louis Armstrong
's commercial resurgence with the song
"Hello, Dolly!"
-- a number one hit that unseated
the Beatles
'
"Can't Buy Me Love"
from the top spot -- came as such a surprise that
Kapp Records
hastened to produce an album to go along with it. The resulting long-player, appropriately titled
Hello, Dolly!
, also went to number one and produced a second hit, the inferior
"I Still Get Jealous."
As you might predict, almost all of the songs are drawn from Broadway shows, and a couple (a re-recording of
"Blueberry Hill"
;
"A Lot of Livin' to Do"
from
Bye Bye Birdie
) lend a veneer of hipness to give the album a "1964 touch" without foisting completely inappropriate material on the 60-something Satchmo.
Armstrong
had one of the most recognizable and personality-laden voices of the 20th century, and although he was past his prime at the time,
shows him at his '60s best. ~ Greg Adams