Brook Benton

A MUSICAL SAGE once quipped, "If you write music, you're a composer. If you write words, you're a lyricist. If you do both, you're Cole Porter." Of course, if you both write and sing beautiful love songs, you're Brook Benton (Porter's vocal prowess is at yet unappreciated). Benton, his lyricist Clyde Otis and the talented composer/arranger Belford Hendricks, produced some of the most endearing and enduring ballads and happy jump tunes of the pre-Soul era, all driven by the singer's mellow baritone.