Greatest Pop / Jazz Standards - Recommendations

[Aloysius]

I don't know much about this genre, but I like what I've been exposed to so far. I own a couple greatest hits / compilations from some of the greats (Sinatra, Bennett), but am looking to get some more classic recordings.

What are some of your favorite songs, vocalists or albums?

Below is the wiki definition of the type of music I'm referring to:

The term pop standards refers to an American songwriting, arranging, and singing style that is widely considered as the high point of Western vocal popular music. The terms standards or American standards are also sometimes used.

This style was at its heyday from the 1930s, throughout World War II, and into the post-war era. It dominated popular music until the birth of rock n' roll in the mid-1950s. Singers packed houses across the country, and the advent and subsequent widespread popularity of radio and movies enabled their music, personalities and distinctive vocal styles to catapult them to superstar status.

As a genre it was embodied by a remarkable and diverse group of singers, writers and stylemakers. Jazz pioneers Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Paul Whiteman first popularized jazz music among a diverse audience. Meanwhile Cole Porter, George Gershwin, and other Tin Pan Alley and Broadway songwriters popularized the "Great American Songbook". Soon afterward, radio introduced millions of Americans to the same songs, often written by artists like Hoagy Carmichael, or sung in a more soothing, personal style by crooners like Rudy Vallee or Bing Crosby.

The big band era further developed the genre of "pop standards". Bandleaders like Tommy Dorsey, Cab Calloway, Benny Goodman, and Count Basie continued to innovate. Big band singers, who had previously been considered instrumentalists and were rarely singled out, now became huge stars, like Frank Sinatra, Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald, and Dinah Shore.

-Al