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Columbia Records CL 1016

Some years ago, Italian movie-makers initiated a cycle beginning with Bread, Love and Dreams, continuing with Bread, Love and Jealousy, which became Frisky in the United States, and finally dwindling down to Bread, Love and.... Now new impetus is being injected, with the title Xavier Cugat has selected for his newest collection of Latin American music, and, as man cannot live by bread alone, neither can he live by cha-cha-cha alone, so the canny Cugie has made room for a pair of calypsos, a mambo and a guaracha mambo to diversify his program.

As popular as ever, after some twenty years of superlative music-making, Cugat has always provided first-class music and first-class entertainment for his fans. When a new dance rhythm came along from Latin America, Cugat was right there to help introduce and popularize the steps, and some of them - the rhumba and conga in particular - he put across virtually singlehandedly. The Cugat sound has always been a rich, full sound, with deep tonal qualities, but his music has never been lacking in liveliness for all that. Indeed, as the years go by it seems as if he and his orchestra pick up enthusiasm for their work and communicate it even more strongly.

During recent years, Cugat has toured Europe with his wife Abbe Lane, arousing wild cheers on all sides for their presentations, and in this country he has been busy with such new dances as the merengue and the cha-cha-cha. This program consists largely of the latter, with a sprinkling of new numbers to give dancers a change of pace and keep them on their toes; Very, Very Satisfied and The Banana Boat Song are in the skyrocking calypso idiom, while Penthouse Mambo is precisely what its title suggests, and Coco seco is a guaracha mambo.

Helping out Xavier Cugat with especial distinction in this collection is Pepito Arvelo, one of the finest new singers. Born and raised in Puerto Rico, he is a guitarist and composer as well as an accomplished vocalist. He has appeared on television with Cugat, and with Eddie Albert and Margo. In Puerto Rico he appeared with the Rafael Hernandez group, and in New York City he led his own orchestra at the St. Regis Hotel for more than four years. In the intervening periods, he has appeared as a vocalist throughout the country, including engagements at Las Vegas. He is heard in the title song, Suavecito, Very, Very Satisfied, La Paloma, Coco seco and The Banana Boat Song. Another interesting contribution to the program is heard in the dazzling French horn work of Joe Mariani.

So here is Cugat once again, serving up a handful of cha-cha-cha to accompany the bread and love. Listening or dancing, you will find the Cugat charm and excitement undiminished, the perfect accompaniment for an evening at home or an evening on the town. Whether his music is new, as much of the collection is, or familiar, in songs such as Frenesi,Whatever Lola Wants and April in Portugal, the Cugat formula is infallible, and infallibly enjoyable.

The extraordinary loaf of bread on which Seņor Cugat is leaning in the cover photograph was especially designed and baked for that purpose; its transportation to the photographer's studio was covered by national news magazines, as befits a veritable king of loaves. The extraordinary creature leaning on Senor Cugat is the talented and incendiary Mrs. Cugat, known professionally as singer Abbe Lane.