Sue Raney Has Found Her Niche as a Balladeer

Signed to Capitol Records in 1957 at age 16, Sue Raney took a shot at teen stardom with silly songs such as “Biology,” which became a minor hit. But, after 11 albums, Raney burned out in her quest to become a pop diva. Following a subsequent 12-year detour into writing and singing jingles, she resumed her career in 1984, concentrating on warm jazz standards.

“Actually, I’m more of a balladeer than a jazz singer,” says Raney, who plays the Horton Grand Hotel in downtown San Diego this Friday and Saturday nights. “Lyrics are more important to me than what the melodic line is doing.”

Raney, who recorded five albums for the Los Angeles-based Discovery label, beginning in 1984, is enjoying renewed interest in those albums, especially the newest. “In Good Company” was one of the last releases from Discovery before the death last year of the label’s founder, Albert Marx.

Last fall, brothers Jac and Keith Holzman acquired the Discovery catalogue and renamed the label First Media/Discovery. They decided to re-release Raney’s recording, and re-mastered and repackaged it.

“We opened up the sound,” Keith Holzman said. “We used a clear, more open mastering system.

“It was never really released. It kind of just got sent out there. Now, we’re getting respectable play. The radio list Albert sent it to was rather limited. Ours is considerably larger. It went to 700 or 800 jazz stations.”

Raney may have a soft spot for classic jazz material, but she doesn’t consider herself a jazz singer in the purest sense.

“Improvisation? I can do it, but not as well as some people,” says Raney, who was born in McPherson, Kan., and lives in Sherman Oaks. “The true jazz musician does it effortlessly. Ella Fitzgerald can do true scatting, but few singers can.”

Although Raney admires Fitzgerald and other jazz legends, she found her own role models on the fringes of jazz.

“I grew up with my mom’s influence of Bing Crosby and Perry Como and Nat Cole,” she says. “Even though I should have been loving Elvis Presley, I didn’t.

“At 13 or 14, I was influenced by pop artists: Rosemary Clooney, Doris Day. Then I started listening to Maxine Sullivan, a wonderful jazz singer who didn’t get much recognition until later.”

Material on “In Good Company” gives a good indication of the strong, romantic ballads Raney prefers, songs like “Mood Indigo,” “After You’ve Gone” and “Indian Summer.”

“An astute person once told me, if you stick with wonderful jazz songs, classical standards, you will work forever,” Raney says. “That doesn’t mean you do them straight, without embellishment. ‘How Deep Is the Ocean’ has to be done in a way that makes it musically right.”

Raney, who hasn’t played San Diego in several years, has a little-known tie to this area. It was San Diego singer Frankie Laine who discovered her during the 1950s.

“I had a mom who really wanted me to be a singer, a star, an artist,” Raney recalls. “She tried really hard for me. In our trips out here (to Los Angeles), she dragged me around and had me sing for people. One place was the office Frankie Laine had. Later, he was out playing golf with Mitch Miller and Jack Carson, the actor and radio personality. They were looking for a teen-ager to be on one of the last radio shows--the ‘Jack Carson Show.’ And Frankie Laine got me the job.”

At the Horton Grand, Raney will be backed by bassist Bob Magnusson, drummer Jim Plank and pianist Mike Wofford, all of whom have played or recorded with Raney often in the past. Music starts at 8:30. Saturday, Raney will tape a new “Club Date” jazz program at KPBS-TV (Channel 15), to air nationally on public television later this year.

San Diegan Charles Simmons hopes to parlay his music industry experience and a new national distribution deal into success for his Opulence Records, a pop-jazz/R&B; label that released its debut recording a year ago.

That release, “Gettin’ Ready For Love,” by vocal duo Chaz and Trinna (Simmons and his wife), is receiving national airplay on more than 80 R&B; and pop-jazz stations, according to Simmons.

Opulence’s next three releases, by San Diego jazz guitarist Hank Easton, San Diego jazz trombonist Aubrey Fay, and 2Che, a female vocal duo from Chino Hills who graced the cover of the March issue of Jet magazine, are due in September.

Easton’s album is a re-release of his 1990 self-produced CD, “San Diego Sunset.”

Simmons’ background includes writing songs for the Shirelles and Billy Vera, doing promotions at RCA, and sales and marketing in other music industry capacities. His hopes for Opulence are pinned, in part, to a distribution deal with Avion Records in Studio City, a company that launched singer Dianne Reeves and saxophonist George Howard under its old name, TBA Records.

By taking advantage of Avion’s international network of independent distributors, Simmons says, “Our intention is to put San Diego on the map.”

RIFFS: Acoustic guitar jocks Strunz and Farah will be interviewed by Art Good during his “JazzTrax” program on KiFM (98.1) Sunday afternoon. The show starts at 4. . . . Good has a strange new idea for his Catalina Island JazzTrax Festival, scheduled for Oct. 2 to 4 and Oct. 9 to 11. He plans to let a few fans listen to the concert on headphones plugged directly into the mixing board. Good would love to equip a whole concert hall with headphones and individual equalizers that would allow listeners to mix the live music to their own tastes. . . . Bitoto, that jazz-influenced African soukous band, plays Carlsbad’s “Jazz in the Parks” series Friday evening from 6 to 8 at Magee Park, Carlsbad Boulevard and Beech Street.

CRITIC’S CHOICE: BLUES SINGER AT JAZZ NOTE

Jimmy Witherspoon says his new release, “The Blues, the Whole Blues, and Nothing But the Blues” is “the best album I’ve done in 32 years.” The recording is Witherspoon’s first for the London-based Indigo label, and he attributes his satisfaction to the TLC accorded the project by Indigo President Mike Vernon, who had worked on earlier Witherspoon recordings at other labels. “I found someone who believes in me, and he did it the right way,” says Witherspoon, who just returned from an 8-week tour of Europe. Overseas, he says he was accorded a king’s welcome--it’s the first time in his career that a first-rate release has been accompanied by thorough promotions and a well-coordinated tour. “I’m on cloud 299!” he says. Witherspoon’s new recording won’t be available in the United States until later this year, but you can catch him live Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights at the Jazz Note in Pacific Beach.