Why does Doris Day's "Cuttin' Capers" mono LP (1959) sound so darn great?

I can't believe how good this sounds! So full of space, bass and details... Who needs stereo with this?

So what was it, the studio? The recording engineer? A special art of microphone placement? The cutting engineer?... All of the above?...

My copy is a 6-eye Columbia Canadian pressing (with dead quiet surface), from US stampers 2A/2A...

 

Not so fast Stevie!
My mono 2K/2K says there's at least two copies

 

I did own this LP. Several years ago, I found it sealed in an antique/ junk shop. A few years later I donated it to a church rummage sale. I do not recall the SQ.

 

All of Ms. Day's Columbia sides in this period, from what I could tell, were cut at the Radio Recorders Annex (later to be spun off as Annex Studios) on North Sycamore, a few doors north to RCA Victor's Hollywood pressing plant. Hence the 'R' in the 45 RPM 'RZSP' prefix in those days (as well as the 'RHCO' prefix on 78's pre-1958 and on tapes made up to '61). Columbia rented space there from 1949 to 1961, at which point they opened their own studios within the Columbia Square complex at 6121 Sunset. As well, all lacquers for LP's and 45's on Columbia in those days were cut in New York.

 

Recorded in November 1958, Radio Recorders, Hollywood:

10th: A2
13th: A4, A5, B6
18th: B3, A6
25th: A3, B2
29th: B5, B1, A1, B4

A1. "Cuttin' Capers" (Joe Lubin)
A2. "Steppin' Out with My Baby" (Irving Berlin)
A3. "Makin' Whoopee!" (Walter Donaldson, Gus Kahn)
A4. "The Lady's in Love with You" (Burton Lane, Frank Loesser)
A5. "Why Don't We Do this More Often?" (Allie Wrubel, Charles Newman)
A6. "Let's Take a Walk Around the Block" (Harold Arlen, Ira Gershwin, Edgar Yipsel Harburg)

B1. "I'm Sitting on Top of the World" (Ray Henderson, Sam M. Lewis, Joe Young)
B2. "Get Out and Get Under the Moon" (Larry Shay, Charles Tobias, William Jerome)
B3. "Fit as a Fiddle (And Ready for Love)" (Arthur Freed, Al Goodhart, Al Hoffman)
B4. "Me Too (Ho Ha! Ho Ha!)" (Charles Tobias, Harry M. Woods, Al Sherman)
B5. "I Feel Like a Feather in the Breeze" (Mack Gordon, Harry Revel)
B6. "Let's Fly Away" (Cole Porter)

 

It must have been a fairly popular LP. My copy is a Terre Haute pressed 6 -Eye 2AC / 2H. They must have needed a few lacquers of it to get to AC on side 1.

 

I just came across one the other day and passed on it, i like her more jazzy side. I've got the ''Day By Night, Night By Day and Dory Previn LPs all six eye mono and in superb condition

 

This is the first I ever heard of DD besides "Que Sera", etc. (the popular stuff), and I am impressed. Not Sarah Vaughan-impressed, but impressed. I ignored that singing was her first career. Really good!

 

The same great sound (as in all of Doris's Radio Recorders tracks) is evident on the Bear Family collection containing "Cuttin' Capers". Also, the orchestrations of Frank DeVol (who later left Hollywood, moved to Fernwood, and opened a sleazy fast-food place called "The Bun n' Run") are really lush....