NEW YORK, Sept. 21 /PRNewswire/ — Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Rod Stewart will be releasing a third volume of his incredibly successful standards series entitled Stardust…The Great American Songbook: Volume III on J Records October 19th. Stewart’s first two Grammy-nominated collections of standards — 2002’s It Had To Be You … The Great American Songbook and 2003’s As Time Goes By … The Great American Songbook, Volume II — have already sold over ten million copies and brought this veteran superstar to a new and even larger audience of all ages.
The Songbook series has been a worldwide phenomenon since the first’s release in 2002. The first two Songbooks entered the Billboard sales charts at #4 and #2, respectively, creating tremendous anticipation and demand for Stardust … Volume III.
Throughout the Songbook recordings, Stewart has managed to make some of the most enduring and romantic compositions ever written his own. “Singing these amazing songs has moved me deeply and given me a much-needed kick in the arse,” Rod the Eternally Mod explains. Even by the standards of a man who has sold more than 130 million albums worldwide, the public’s embrace of these albums during a most challenging time in the music industry has been nothing short of stunning. Remarkably, Stewart’s first Songbook album remained on the Billboard Top 200 chart for almost two years.
Rod Stewart has spent most of 2004 on the road, having just wrapped up an 82-city tour “From Maggie May To The Great American Songbook,” which was one of the Top 5 most successful tours of the year according to Pollstar Magazine. Comments Clive Davis, Chairman and CEO of BMG Music Group and producer of the Songbook albums: “Rod’s first album of The Great American Songbook won a Grammy nomination and literally exploded in sales all over the world,” says Davis. “Then Volume II repeated the phenomenon with another Grammy nomination and another multi-platinum sales success. Quite simply, Rod inimitably captures wonderful classic standards, breathes new life into them and makes them his own. Stardust: The Great American Songbook: Volume III will be its own gem. It’s sparkling, fresh and alive, with Rod being more and more comfortable in this great genre of music.” Other producers for Stardust…The Great American Songbook: Volume III Include legendary record makers Steve Tyrell and Richard Perry. As with It Had To Be You and As Time Goes By, the material for Stardust consists of some of the most loved songs ever written. Stewart himself confesses to being particularly satisfied with his performance of “What A Wonderful World” made famous by the great Louis Armstrong. Other tracks on the album include “For Sentimental Reasons,” “Embraceable You”, “S’Wonderful,” “But Not For Me,” “Stardust,” “I Can’t Get Started,” “Isn’t It Romantic,” “Night And Day,” and a terrific version of the classic duet, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” that finds Stewart’s trading lines with another enduring musical icon, Dolly Parton. Other sensational duets on the album include Bette Midler on “Manhattan,” Stevie Wonder on harmonica on “What A Wonderful World,” and Eric Clapton on “Blue Moon.”
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