Yes I Can! The Sammy Davis Jr. Story

Disc 1
1	Smile, Darn Ya, Smile 2:34
2	Gypsy in My Soul 2:34
3	Hey There 2:48
4	Birth of the Blues 3:17
5	Easy to Love 2:24
6	My Funny Valentine 3:08
7	That Old Black Magic 3:19
8	Love Me or Leave Me 2:57
9	Something's Gotta Give 2:04
10	Too Close for Comfort 2:22
11	There's a Small Hotel With Carmen Mcrae 3:29
12	I Guess I'll Hang My Tears out to Dry 4:41
13	But Not for Me 3:23
14	Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered With Mundell Lowe 4:26
15	I Got Plenty O' Nuttin' 3:29
16	There's a Boat Dat's Leavin' Soon for New York 4:00
17	Soliloquy 9:44
18	Change Partners 2:51
19	The Lady Is a Tramp 4:23
20	Gee Baby, Ain't I Good to You 3:50
21	Get on the Right Track, Baby 2:44
Disc 2
1	A Lot of Livin' to Do 2:45
2	Begin the Beguine 4:30
3	My Romance 3:32
4	Falling in Love with Love 2:27
5	Soon 2:49
6	Thou Swell 3:00
7	Let There Be Love 2:51
8	Guys and Dolls 2:09
9	Bye Bye Blackbird 2:49
10	Blame It on My Youth 4:16
11	Here's That Rainy Day With Laurindo Almeida 2:19
12	Lush Life 3:47
13	A Stranger in Town 3:46
14	What Kind of Fool Am I? 3:24
15	Once in a Lifetime 2:10
16	Someone Nice Like You 2:24
17	As Long as She Needs Me 3:06
18	I Married an Angel 1:59
19	Falling in Love Again 3:26
20	Me and My Shadow With Frank Sinatra 3:07
21	Teach Me Tonight With Count Basie 3:06
22	April in Paris With Count Basie 2:46
23	Night Song 4:05
24	I Want to Be With You With Paula Wayne 4:34
Disc 3
1	I've Gotta Be Me 2:55
2	Who Can I Turn To (When Nobody Needs Me) 3:00
3	Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye With Laurindo Almeida 4:06
4	This Was My Love 4:23
5	If I Ruled the World 2:35
6	The Shelter of Your Arms 2:52
7	Yes I Can 2:17
8	Gonna Build a Mountain 2:23
9	Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat 3:32
10	'Deed I Do 2:12
11	Walkin' My Baby Back Home 2:36
12	The Party's Over 4:13
13	Unforgettable 2:32
14	People 2:57
15	Here I'll Stay 3:08
16	I Think I Like You 2:57
17	At the Crossroads 2:17
18	I'll Begin Again 2:33
19	The Candy Man With the Mike Curb Congregation 3:12
20	Mr. Bojangles 5:47
21	Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow (Baretta's Theme) 2:25
22	I'm Not Anyone 4:08
23	Life Is a Woman 4:14
24	Lover, Come Back to Me 2:55
Disc 4
1	Something's Gotta Give 2:17
2	And This Is My Beloved 2:41
3	Hey There 1:36
4	It's All Right with Me 5:53
5	Ethel, Baby 2:48
6	Too Close for Comfort 1:25
7	Once in a Lifetime 2:20
8	What Kind of Fool Am I? 3:19
9	West Side Story Medley: Jet Song/Something's Coming/Cool/Tonight/A ... 4:47
10	Rock-A-Bye Your Baby with a Dixie Melody 10:26
11	Come Back to Me 2:55
12	Birth of the Blues 3:33
13	Once in Love with Amy 2:42
14	If It's the Last Thing I Do 3:20
15	Please Don't Talk About Me When I'm Gone 2:38
16	With a Song in My Heart 2:09
17	As Long as She Needs Me 2:30
18	Bye Bye Blackbird 2:53
19	Where or When 3:27
20	You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Loves You 3:22
21	Without a Song 3:50
22	I've Gotta Be Me 3:02

Barnes & Noble

"To describe the prodigious talents of Sammy Davis Jr. is, indeed, a difficult task to accomplish in a small space. The man who can sing, dance, impersonate, produce, direct, be funny, and be dramatic is a rare find in show business at any time." So says Frank Sinatra of his Rat Pack compadre in the impressive 96-page booklet that accompanies this long-overdue four-CD box set tribute. An artist who was regarded less seriously by the general public (and the press too, to some degree) than were Sinatra and fellow Rat Packer Dean Martin, Davis was blessed with an incomparable array of creative gifts that defined a personal style as unique as any of his peers'. Despite personal demons (sensitively enumerated in Gerald Early's thoughtful essay on the political and cultural issues informing Davis's life and times) that drove him into some foolhardy projects for the sake of a buck, the valleys remain well in the shadow of the peaks, especially the musical ones. Those are on stunning display here, beginning with 1949's fanciful "Smile, Darn Ya, Smile" (notable less for Sammy's ebullient vocal than for the fancy tap-dancing he does on the track) and winding up 90 tracks later with a powerful version of the man's raison d'etre, "I've Gotta Be Me," a 1977 track from this collection's all-live fourth disc. In between those moments Davis is presented assaying the 20th century popular songbook, with formidable interpretations of Porter, the Gershwins, Johnny Mercer, Rodgers and Hart, Styne and Cahn, Bricusse and Newley…the list goes on, nearly every writer represented being in the top rank of his generation. Yes, the unfortunate "The Candy Man" is here, but that was Sammy too (and really, who could have made more of it than he?). Better to remember him for the dreamy interpretation of Rodgers and Hart's "My Romance," or the winsome reading of "Hey There," or the amazing blend of intense drama and tender heartedness he brings to his Top 20 single from 1963, "The Shelter of Your Arms." Or pick your own transcendent performance -- there's a raft of them here on what is one of the smartest, most thoughtfully assembled box sets ever released. David McGee

All Music Guide

It's hard to believe that a Sammy Davis Jr. box set retrospective was not released until 1999. One simple reason for the delay is that Davis' discography is a licensing nightmare, so the initial triumph of Warner Archives/Reprise/Rhino's four-disc Yes I Can! The Sammy Davis, Jr. Story is that it brings together material controlled by Time Warner, EMI-Capitol, Universal, and the Davis estate. But another reason why a Sammy Davis, Jr. box set may not have been an immediate priority is that recording was never his primary medium. Davis was first and foremost a live performer with an act that included singing, dancing, and impressions; everything else -- Broadway shows, films, television, record-making -- was secondary. Despite being possessed of a clear, powerful baritone and precise diction, Davis was always more a performer than a singer. His repertoire as presented here is dominated by songs written for stage and movie musicals by the cream of the interwar pop songwriters. Davis renders this material well, but the lyrics rarely mean much to him beyond being vehicles for his own self-expression (vocal effects, comic interjections, etc.). When this began to change in 1961, it was because a highly self-referential performer found a songwriter, Leslie Bricusse, whose subject was self-absorption. Writing for musicals, Bricusse secondarily provides Davis with material he sings with unprecedented conviction, because it allows him to explore his own dreams and doubts. The claims for Sammy Davis, Jr.'s importance as an all-around entertainer cannot be disputed by anyone who has seen him perform in any medium, and strictly as a recording artist, much of that appeal comes across. Yes I Can! The Sammy Davis, Jr. Story is more the statement of a magnetic personality than it is a collection of meaningfully sung songs, but it is no less impressive for that. William Ruhlmann