Banu Gibson sings songs from the RKO films of Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers

Every rare now and then something special happens in the world of the arts. Perhaps it’s because the stars are in alignment or the muses have been working overtime. Whatever the case, there was magic in the air when Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers made nine musicals together in the 1930s. There has never been anything to rival that achievement in the decades since.
Timing was certainly on their side. They couldn’t have been a great screen team ten years earlier: that was the era of silent film.
They could have worked together ten years later (and did, one final time, in 1949), but the country and its movies had changed by the 1940s. With war raging in Europe and Japan, America’s escapist entertainment had a harder edge and the airy world of make-believe that audiences digested so easily in the 1930s had a different flavor. Art deco was no longer in fashion, so we wouldn’t have had those beautiful big white sets, and George Gershwin wouldn’t have been around to work on the score of Shall We Dance?
These films were very much products of the 1930s, yet they seem timeless to fans who still cherish them today. What’s more, the songs, created especially for Astaire and Rogers by some of the greatest composers and lyricists of the 20th century, have had a life of their own and show no signs of fading into obscurity.
What are the odds that such great songs would be fashioned for a man who was known as a dancer, not a singer, and a woman who never once had a hit record?
Yet songwriters like Irving Berlin, Dorothy Fields and Jimmy McHugh, and the Gershwins loved having their music showcased in these popular films. Ginger may not have been a great vocalist but she was a peerless performer, and while Astaire has always been underrated as a singer, Berlin and others valued his phrasing and the way he “sold” their material.
Some of the songs in the Astaire-Rogers films were designed to propel the plot (“Isn’t this a Lovely Day”) or establish the characters’ relationship (“Pick Yourself Up”). Some were intended as stand-alone showcases for Fred (“Top Hat, White Tie and Tails,” “No Strings”) or Ginger (“Let Yourself Go,” “Music Makes Me”), while others were meant to be show-stopping production numbers for the team (“Let’s Face the Music and Dance” et al).
But as Banu Gibson reaffirms in this lively collection, almost all of these compositions stand on their own quite apart from the movies that brought them into existence. One doesn’t have to be able to picture Fred Astaire doing his bravura tribute to Bill Robinson or Ginger shivering in the cold as Fred serenades her with “A Fine Romance” to enjoy these fresh vocal performances.
Banu has a great simpatico with music of this period and it’s clear that she loves these tunes. What’s more, she always surrounds herself with like-minded colleagues. This album features an all-star lineup of talented musicians who capture the energy and ebullience of the Astaire-Rogers songs right alongside the star vocalist. (Even contemporary satirist and voice artist extraordinaire Harry Shearer gets into the spirit in his duet with Banu on “A Fine Romance.”)
Whenever I see an Astaire-Rogers musical I feel my spirits soar, and this collection puts me in the same happy place. I defy you to listen to Banu and her musical confrères without smiling.

Leonard Maltin