Various Artists, Christmas with Sinatra and Friends (Concord)

sinatraA disappointment, not because it’s bad, but I was hoping for a Sinatra Christmas album I hadn’t heard. Instead, it’s a repackaging of lesser known Sinatra Christmas music padded with unrelated songs by Rosemary Clooney, Mel Torme, Tony Bennett and Ray Charles & Betty Carter. Fine but unnecessary—a part of the timehonored Christmas music tradition of exploitative releases.