Roberta Flack - First Take (1972 Japanese Atlantic Vinyl LP)

Roberta Flack - First Take | Vinyl LP - 1972 Japanese Atlantic pressing (P-8242A, Warner-Pioneer)

Roberta Flack was a classically trained pianist teaching school in Washington when the jazz musician Les McCann heard her singing in a club and brought her to Atlantic. First Take, her 1969 debut, was cut quickly, hence the title, with the producer Joel Dorn framing her clear, controlled voice in a jazz setting. Ron Carter plays bass throughout, and on the uptempo numbers a jazz horn section of Frank Wess, Joe Newman and others gives it real swing. The material is wide open: Gene McDaniels's protest tune "Compared To What", two Donny Hathaway songs, Leonard Cohen's "Hey, That's No Way To Say Goodbye". At the still centre is "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", an Ewan MacColl folk song that Flack slows almost to a standstill, singing it barely above a whisper. It is one of the great intimate vocal performances on record.

The album sat quietly for three years until Clint Eastwood used "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" in his 1971 film Play Misty for Me. The song took off, reached number one in 1972 and won the Grammy for Record of the Year, and First Take, a debut most people had missed, suddenly went to the top of the charts. That is what brought it to Japan in June 1972, this among the first Japanese copies. Flack went on to a long and illustrious career.

This is the 1972 Japanese pressing on Atlantic, made by Warner-Pioneer, with Les McCann's original liner notes.