Beautiful Ballads & Love Songs

by Aretha Franklin

Overview

Beautiful Ballads & Love Songs, released in 2008 by Arista/Legacy -- and then, bizarrely, retitled and repackaged only a year later as From the Heart -- draws from as far back as 1964 and as late as 2003, primarily anthologizing some of Aretha Franklin's most romantic songs from her Arista albums, but it's too scattershot to be one of the go-to compilations in her catalog. Almost half of the selections (most of the highlights, in fact) come from Aretha's pair of early-'80s Luther Vandross-driven albums, Jump to It and Get It Right, while the remainder of the studio albums through So Damn Happy are represented. A pair of standards from the '60s, "Unforgettable" and "Misty," seem thrown in to attract those who would otherwise disregard a set reliant on '80s and '90s cuts. (And frankly, it's easy to disregard such a thing when something as messy as the 1989 collaboration with James Brown, "Gimme Your Love," is involved.) ~ Andy Kellman

Product Details

Release Date:	01/15/2008
Label:	Legacy / Rca
UPC:	0886972162720
Rank:	119529

Tracks

1. (It's Just) Your Love
2. Love Pang
3. I Got Your Love
4. You Are My Joy
5. Misty
6. Freeway of Love
7. This Is for Real
8. Love Me Right
9. Every Girl (Wants My Guy)
10. When You Love Me Like That
11. Unforgettable
12. Gimme Your Love
13. A Rose Is Still a Rose
14. Never Leave You Again
15. Until You Say You Love Me
16. Giving In

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Aretha Franklin   Primary Artist
James Brown   Primary Artist
Clarence Clemons   Soloist,Saxophone
Adi Yeshaya   String Conductor

Technical Credits

Michael J. Powell   Audio Production,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Cory Rooney   Audio Production,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Narada Michael Walden   Audio Production,Arranger,Composer,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Robert Mersey   Audio Production,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Clyde Otis   Audio Production,Original Recording Producer,Producer
Aretha Franklin   Audio Production,Composer,Producer,Vocal Arrangement,Original Recording Producer
Sean Combs   Audio Production,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Lauryn Hill   Audio Production,Arranger,Producer,Original Recording Producer
Luther Vandross   Audio Production,Original Recording Producer,Rhythm Arrangements,Vocal Arrangement,Producer
Rob Mounsey   Horn Arrangements,String Arrangements
Nat Adderley, Jr.   Rhythm Arrangements
Akua Dixon   String Arrangements
Marcus Miller   Rhythm Arrangements
Paul Riser   Horn Arrangements,String Arrangements
Harry Goodwin   Photography
Howard Fritzson   Art Direction
Adi Yeshaya   String Arrangements
Harry Langdon   Tray Photo
Steven Berkowitz   A&R
Leon Pendarvis   String Arrangements,Horn Arrangements
Gretchen Brennison   Project Director
Jeremy Holiday   Packaging Manager
Mark Wilder   Mastering