Like a ghost, a ghost of something old

My new favourite album was released back in 1969. I’ve been playing it often over the past day or two. Sumptuous arrangements, the intelligent interpretation of standards and a superlative blue-eyed soul voice would not have interested me twenty years ago but, as a reflective 41 year old, I am able to nod with appreciation and purr with admiration at the delights that Dusty Springfield’s Dusty in Memphis brings. Springfield’s sultry, laid back and smoky tones add so much to an array of beautiful numbers penned by the masters of the songwriting game, Bacharach and David, Goffin and King inter alia. The rendition of Breakfast in Bed is wonderful; being a reggae aficionado, I have always adored the exquisite version by Lorna Bennett but Springfield’s is an exotic reading of the song and is, in my opinion, of equal merit.