3 LPs on 2 CDs 24 BIT DIGITALLY REMASTERED STEREO La Vergne Smith was a singer and pianist whose warm, engaging way with torch songs and bluesy tunes was a popular part of the night-life French Quarter of her native New Orleans in the late 40s and 50s. Her vocal style was intimate and sensitive, and her self-accompaniment on piano simplest, yet she still projected a sophisticated approach that delighted the clientele of the smarter, candlelight saloons that began appearing there in 1947. In this case, the boîte was the Old Absinthe House, located at the corner of Bienville and Bourbon streets in New Orleans, and known for the worm-wood derivative for which the place was named absinthe. It was in that musty green ambience, where she started singing in early 1954, that her Cook and Savoy albums included here were recorded. And it was there, during the third year of her engagement, that her artistry was captured on the Vik label for the final album of this set, on which she sings with so much feeling, warmth and conviction, enhanced by some fine, sympathetic New Orleans musicians.