Her Very Best

These 18 songs are all drawn from Grant's Era recordings in the mid-'50s. That period certainly found her at her commercial prime, encompassing the 1956 number one hit "The Wayward Wind" and the 1955 Top Tenner "Suddenly There's a Valley," which lead off this collection. Grant might have been better suited, though, to an era five or ten years prior to the one at which she hit her peak. These easy listening vocals, with slight shades of torch song jazz and strong debts to theatrical show tunes, were heavy on the sentiment and stitched by stiff cinematic orchestral big-band arrangements and backup choirs. Grant, too, was a capable but second-tier adult pop singer, not one given to reaching deep for expressive emotion. Certainly "The Wayward Wind" is a highlight, with a more memorable melody than the other tracks and an arrangement spotlighting memorable French horn declarations. She loosens up just a bit on the jazziest numbers, like "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams" and "Love Is the Sweetest Thing," and "When the Tide Is High" has some of the twisting melodic melodrama of "The Wayward Wind."