Music: New Pop Records, Oct. 12, 1953

Premiered by Ellington (Capitol, 2 EPs). Eight famous songs, including Stardust, Three Little Words, Stormy Weather, which first saw the light of night under the Duke’s baton. Fine, swinging performances.

Woody Herman at Carnegie Hall, 1946 (MGM, LP). Fifteen rowdy and tender numbers played by one of the swingingest bands of all. Herman’s 1946 “Herd,” for all its size and precision, sounds as flexible as a small jam band.

Glenn Miller & His Orchestra (Victor, 14 EPs). This package should be to the Miller legend what Bulfinch was to the Greek. There are 59 numbers by the late famed bandleader and his polished crew, 31 of them dubbed from radio broadcasts; the rest are reissues of familiar Miller disks made between 1939 and 1942. They, are packaged in pigskin, with program notes (by Jazz Expert George Frazier) and drawings of Miller himself. Price: $25.

New Orleans (Jo Stafford & Frankie Laine; Columbia LP). Two favorite singers blend their talents for a reminiscence of New Orleans. The Stafford-Laine city is a place of chimney sweeps (Raminay!), gastronomy (Jambalaya), and nostalgia (Way Down Yonder in New Orleans, etc.). Some of the backgrounds give a jazzlike lift to the proceedings.

Embrasse (Felicia Sanders; Columbia). A semi-French invitation to give the girl a great big kiss. Sung by up-and-coming Songstress Sanders (TIME, Aug. 3), it should climb well up bestseller lists.

My Love, My Life, My Happiness (Ames Brothers; Victor). A till-death-do-us-part ditty in a barbershop treatment by the popular Ames trio.

St. George and the Dragonet (Stan Freberg; Capitol). A parody of the portentous theme song of the radio and TV crime show, Dragnet, which comes on the heels of Ray Anthony’s bestselling record of the same theme song (TIME, Sept. 28). The deadpan private eye, in this case St. George himself, sets out to haul in a dragon which has been devouring maidens out of season. On the reverse, Funnyman Freberg mimics the same crime-show mannerisms in telling the story of Little Blue Riding Hood (“the color has been changed to prevent an investigation”).

You’ll Have to Swing It (Ella Fitzgerald; Decca). The versatile Ella remakes one of Martha Raye’s oldies (“Mr. Paganini, please play my rhapsody”), slips from sweet to husky to artless scat-singing without losing her solid beat.