Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Linda Ronstadt, Rhino Records 2019.
Linda Ronstadt has joined the list of legendary performers who have recently released an album of live material from many decades ago.
It’s interesting that this is the first live album of her career despite releasing more than two dozen studio releases.
The album has been culled from an amazing performance she recorded in 1980 for her HBO television special.
Recorded on 24 April at Television Centre Studios in Hollywood, the concert captures Ronstadt at the peak of her career.
In the concert she was joined by an outstanding band that included guitarists Kenny Edwards and Danny Kortchmar, drummer Russ Kunkel, bassist Bob Glaub, keyboardist Billy Payne and pedal steel guitarist Dan Dugmore.
Rounding out the band were backing vocalist Wendy Waldman and Peter Asher, Ronstadt’s producer, who played percussion and sang backing vocals.
The album was very close to never being released because for a long time the whereabouts of the master tapes were unknown.
It was an ice-skating rink-side conversation between producer John Boylan and a Warner Bros. audio engineer, while they were watching their sons play ice hockey, that led to the long lost tapes resurfacing.
Boylan commented “I have no way of calculating the odds of finding the missing tapes through a chance encounter at a hockey practice, but they must be astronomical – like winning the lottery.”
The outcome however is that all Ronstadt fans have won the lottery through this unlikely case of serendipity.
The performances are wonderful and she includes all her well known songs and hits.
