''What's New'' is an album of

traditional pop Traditional pop (also known as vocal pop or pre-rock and roll pop) is Western culture, Western pop music that generally pre-dates the advent of rock and roll in the mid-1950s. The most popular and enduring songs from this era of music are known ...

standards released by American singer

Linda Ronstadt Linda Maria Ronstadt (born July 15, 1946) is an American singer who has performed and recorded in diverse genres including rock, country, light opera, the Great American Songbook, and Latin music. Ronstadt has earned 11 Grammy Awards, three A ...

in 1983. It represents the first in a trilogy of 1980s albums Ronstadt recorded with arranger

Nelson Riddle Nelson Smock Riddle Jr. (June 1, 1921 – October 6, 1985) was an American arranger, composer, bandleader and orchestrator whose career stretched from the late 1940s to the mid-1980s. He worked with many vocalists at Capitol Records, including ...

John Kosh John Kosh, known simply as Kosh, is an English art director, album cover designer, graphic artist, and documentary producer/director. He was born in London, England and rose to prominence in the mid-1960s while designing for the Royal Ballet a ...

designed the album covers for all three albums.

Production

The album was a major change in direction because Ronstadt was then considered the leading female vocalist in rock. Both her record company and manager, Peter Asher, were very reluctant to produce this album with Ronstadt, but eventually her determination won them over and the albums exposed a whole new generation to the sounds of the pre-swing and swing eras. The one-time popular music sung by

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Honorific nicknames in popular music, Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Board" and "Ol' Blue Eyes", he is regarded as one of the Time 100: The Most I ...

Ella Fitzgerald Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April25, 1917June15, 1996) was an American singer, songwriter and composer, sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song", "Queen of Jazz", and "Lady Ella". She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phra ...

Tony Bennett Anthony Dominick Benedetto (August 3, 1926 – July 21, 2023), known professionally as Tony Bennett, was an American jazz and traditional pop singer. He received many accolades, including 20 Grammy Awards, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, ...

Rosemary Clooney Rosemary Clooney (May 23, 1928 – June 29, 2002) was an American singer and actress. She came to prominence in the early 1950s with the song "Come On-a My House", which was followed by other pop numbers such as "Botch-a-Me (Ba-Ba-Baciami Piccin ...

Peggy Lee Norma Deloris Egstrom (May 26, 1920 – January 21, 2002), known professionally as Peggy Lee, was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, and actress whose career spanned seven decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local r ...

, and their contemporaries was relegated in the 1960s and 1970s to Las Vegas club acts and elevator music. Ronstadt later remarked that she did her part in rescuing these songs which she called "little jewels of artistic expression" from "spending the rest of their lives riding up and down on the elevators." The album's second single, "

I've Got a Crush on You "I've Got a Crush on You" is a song composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin. It is unique among Gershwin compositions in that it was used for two different Broadway productions: ''Treasure Girl'' (1928), when it was introduced by ...

" had already been part of Ronstadt's repertoire for several years, as she'd performed it during a 1980 appearance on ''

The Muppet Show ''The Muppet Show'' is a variety sketch comedy television series created by Jim Henson and starring the Muppets. It is presented as a variety show, featuring recurring sketches and musical numbers interspersed with ongoing plot-lines with ru ...

''.

Reception

''What's New'' was released in September 1983 and spent 81 weeks on the main ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'' album chart. Its release came as the radio programming format known as

Adult Standards Adult standards (also sometimes known as the nostalgia or Big Band format) is a North American radio format heard primarily on AM or class A FM stations. Adult standards started in the 1950s and is aimed at "mature" adults, meaning mainly tho ...

was taking off via programming concepts such as

Music of Your Life Music of Your Life is an American syndicated music radio format featuring adult standards music. First created by recording executive Al Ham in 1978, the format achieved popularity in the 1980s among AM radio stations in the United States and Ca ...

, which specialized in returning pre-rock popular music and the songs of the

Great American Songbook The Great American Songbook is the loosely defined canon of significant 20th-century American jazz standards, popular songs, and show tunes. Definition According to the Great American Songbook Foundation: The "Great American Songbook" is th ...

to the American airwaves. The album held the number 3 position for five consecutive weeks while

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Michael Jackson, one of the most culturally significan ...

's '' Thriller'' and

Lionel Richie Lionel Brockman Richie Jr. (born June 20, 1949) is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, and television personality. He rose to fame in the 1970s as a songwriter and the co-lead singer of the Motown group Commodores; writing and recor ...

's '' Can't Slow Down'' locked in the number 1 and number 2 album positions. The album also reached number 2 on the jazz albums chart. It was

RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

certified Certification is part of testing, inspection and certification and the provision by an independent body of written assurance (a certificate) that the product, service or system in question meets specific requirements. It is the formal attestatio ...

Triple Platinum for sales of over 3 million copies in the United States alone. Global sales surpassed five million. The album also earned Ronstadt another

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious ...

nomination for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female alongside

Donna Summer Donna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948May 17, 2012), known professionally as Donna Summer, was an American singer and songwriter. She gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s and became known as the "Queen of Disco", while her music ...

Bonnie Tyler Gaynor Sullivan (née Hopkins; born 8 June 1951), known professionally as Bonnie Tyler, is a Welsh singer. Known for her distinctive husky voice, Tyler came to prominence with the release of her 1977 album '' The World Starts Tonight'' and its ...

Irene Cara Irene Cara Escalera (March 18, 1959 – November 25, 2022) was an American singer and actress who rose to prominence for her role as Coco Hernandez in the 1980 musical film '' Fame'', and for recording the film's title song " Fame", which reach ...

and

Sheena Easton Sheena Shirley Easton (; born 27 April 1959) is a Scottish singer and actress who achieved recognition in an episode of the reality television series ''The Big Time (TV series), The Big Time: Pop Singer'', which recorded her attempts to gain a ...

, all of whom performed live on the 1984

Grammy The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious a ...

telecast. Two singles, the title song and "I've Got a Crush on You," became hits on

Adult Contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

radio stations, with the title song also reaching number 53 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. All tracks are also included in the compilation "'Round Midnight", released on Asylum Records in 1986. Stephen Holden of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' noted the significance of the album to popular culture when he wrote that ''What's New'' "isn't the first album by a rock singer to pay tribute to the golden age of pop, but is ... the best and most serious attempt to rehabilitate an idea of pop that

Beatlemania Beatlemania was the fanaticism surrounding the English rock band the Beatles from 1963 to 1966. The group's popularity grew in the United Kingdom in late 1963, propelled by the singles " Please Please Me", "From Me to You" and " She Loves Yo ...

and the mass marketing of rock LPs for teen-agers undid in the mid-60s. In the decade prior to Beatlemania, most of the great band singers and crooners of the 40s and 50s codified a half-century of American pop standards on dozens of albums, many of them now long out-of-print."

Track listing

Personnel

– vocals *

Don Grolnick Don Grolnick (September 23, 1947 – June 1, 1996) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and record producer. He was a member of the groups Steps Ahead and Dreams, both with Michael Brecker, and played often with the Brecker Brothers. As a sess ...

– grand piano *

Tommy Tedesco Thomas Joseph Tedesco (July 3, 1930 – November 10, 1997) was an American guitarist and studio musician in Los Angeles and Hollywood. He was part of the loose collective of the area's leading session musicians later popularly known as The Wre ...

– guitar (1-4, 6, 8, 9) *

Dennis Budimir Dennis Matthew Budimir (June 20, 1938 – January 10, 2023) was an American jazz and rock guitarist. He was considered to be a member of the Wrecking Crew. Biography Budimir learned to play piano and guitar in his youth and first played profe ...

– guitar (5, 7) * Ray Brown – bass guitar (1-4, 6, 8, 9) *

Jim Hughart James David Hughart (born July 28, 1936) is a jazz and pop bass player. Biography Hughart was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, and is the son of Frederick (Fritz) Hughart, bassist with Minneapolis Symphony and San Diego Symphony ...

– bass guitar (5, 7) *

John Guerin John Payne Guerin (October 31, 1939 – January 5, 2004) was an American percussionist. He was a proponent of the jazz-rock style. Biography Guerin was born in Hawaii and raised in San Diego. As a young drummer, he began performing with Buddy ...

– drums *

Tony Terran Anthony Terran (May 30, 1926 – March 20, 2017) was an American trumpet player and session musician. He was part of the Wrecking Crew, a group of largely uncredited session musicians in Los Angeles, California, who helped famous artists record ...

– trumpet solo (2) * Chauncey Welsch – trombone solo (8) *

Plas Johnson Plas John Johnson Jr. () (born July 21, 1931) is an American soul-jazz and hard bop tenor saxophonist, probably most widely known as the tenor saxophone soloist on Henry Mancini’s " The Pink Panther Theme". He also performs on alto and bar ...

– tenor sax solo (4) * Bob Cooper – tenor sax solo (6, 7) *

– arrangements and conductor * Leonard Atkins – concertmaster * Nathan Ross – concertmaster

Production

Peter Asher Peter Asher (born 22 June 1944) is an English guitarist, singer, manager and record producer. He came to prominence in the 1960s as a member of the pop music vocal duo Peter and Gordon before going on to a successful career as a manager and re ...

– producer *

George Massenburg George Y. Massenburg (born Baltimore, Maryland c. 1947) is a Grammy award-winning recording engineer and inventor. Working principally in Baltimore, Los Angeles, Nashville, and Macon, Georgia, Massenburg is widely known for submitting a paper t ...

– engineer, mixing * Barbara Rooney – recording assistant, mix assistant * Robert Spano – recording assistant, mix assistant *

Doug Sax Doug Sax (April 26, 1936 – April 2, 2015) was an American mastering engineer from Los Angeles, California. He mastered three The Doors' albums, including their 1967 debut; six Pink Floyd's albums, including '' The Wall''; Ray Charles' multiple ...

– mastering at The Mastering Lab (Hollywood, California). * Gloria Boyce – album coordinator *

– art direction, design *

Ron Larson Roland "Ron" Edwin Larson (born October 31, 1941) is a professor of mathematics at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, Pennsylvania. He is best known for being the author of a series of widely used mathematics textbooks ranging from middle sc ...

– art direction, design * Brian Aris – photography * Genny Schorr – wardrobe stylist

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Release history

References

External links

* {{Authority control 1983 albums Linda Ronstadt albums Albums arranged by Nelson Riddle Albums produced by Peter Asher 1980s covers albums Elektra Records albums Asylum Records albums Traditional pop albums