Burl Ives - Scouting Along (2022) [Hi-Res]

Scouting Along With Burl Ives is a curious little album he made for Columbia while under contract to Decca Records in the early '60s. Subtitled "The Official Boy Scouts Album," it features Ives and a chorus of young boys singing songs about fishing, camping, honor, and the Boy Scouts of America. The recordings are fully orchestrated by Sid Bass with harpsichord, drums, banjo, piano, and other instruments, and the boys are a practiced choir -- not a bunch of amateur kids belting it out. The German roots of the Boy Scouts are made explicit on "I Points to Mineself," which is sung partly in German and partly in German-accented English. The gang rips through "Clementine," and "She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain" in high spirits before concluding in quasi-military fashion with a solemn vocal rendition of "Taps." Scouting Along With Burl Ives is essentially a work-for-hire children's album made for the Boy Scouts and is therefore of limited appeal, but the professionalism and enthusiasm Ives and Bass exhibit are admirable. ~ Greg Adams