Like all jazz immortals, Gene Ammons thrived in many settings. His Prestige jam sessions established the recording format for an entire era; he was a thoroughgoing master of the blues and a natural in an organ combo. When it came to playing ballads, though, Ammons outdid himself; and this collection, surveying his ballad work from 1960 to 1971, with accompaniment ranging from a lone electric piano to a full big band, is definitive Ammons balladry. Whether crooning venerable standards like "Talk of the Town" or "You Go to My Head" with a quartet, exploring less familiar titles such as "Don't Go to Strangers" and "Love I've Found You," or even backing Etta Jones on "If You Are But a Dream," the tenor balladry here is strictly Boss.

It's the Talk of the Town, They Say You're Laughing at Me, You Go to My Head, A Stranger in Town, If You Are But a Dream, I Sold My Heart to the Junkman, My Romance, I Want to Be Loved, Here's That Rainy Day, Don't Go to Strangers, A House Is Not a Home, Love I've Found You

with Mal Waldron, Wendell Marshall, Ed Thigpen, Patti Bown, George Duvivier, Walter Perkins, Etta Jones, Arthur Taylor, Ray Barretto, Tommy Flanagan, Doug Watkins, Red Holloway, George Barrow, Clark Terry, Hobart Dotson, Bob Ashton, Oliver Nelson, Richard Wyands, Bill English, Junior Mance, Buster Williams, Frankie Jones, Candido, Roland Hanna

Recorded between 1960 and 1971.