Girl Meets Boy

by John BushPeggy King was a singer who possessed a cute soprano voice with the character and subtle strength of Debbie Reynolds. A concept LP, Girl Meets Boy pairs King with Jerry Vale for a musical dissection of a love affair, beginning with King's sweetly innocent "The Boy Next Door" and continuing through "Would You Like to Take a Walk?" and "Let's Fall in Love." Felicia Sanders briefly catches the eyes of Vale with "I Wanna Be Loved" and "Temptation," but King of course wins the boy back and they celebrate with the closer, "Love Is Here to Stay." In similar company to Mel Tormé's Prelude to a Kiss and several other story-in-song LPs of the time, Girl Meets Boy leans less on jazz (or even jazz interpretation) than the musical scores that were lighting up the charts during the mid-'50s. Still, King carries the LP well, and Percy Faith's orchestration is appropriately grand, sweeping along at the pace of a promenade.