Sir Michael Parkinson, or "Parky" as he is affectionately known to millions of television viewers across the globe, always came across as such a nice guy on his show that one can almost forgive him for putting his name to what really is little more than just another collection of popular songs.

The peg on which he hangs this double CD is pretty wobbly, too, like: "The songs of the Great American Songbook were the lullabies of my infancy?"

Be that as it may, because if the music on these two CDs truly represents his "life in music", then he has quite eclectic tastes, varying from Sinatra (clearly his all-time favourite), Ella Fitzgerald and Tony Bennett to Nat King Cole, George Benson, Chris Rea, Dionne Warwick and many others.

And that is the main mitigating factor favouring this collection: there are 20 songs on each of the two discs, many of them worthwhile classics, even though much of it is the sort of music one's parents, or grand-parents probably grooved to.

Although, in fairness, not all the artists were in the ark with Noah because also featured are Rod Stewart ('Downtown Train'), Elton John ('Rocket Man'), Sting ('Englishman in New York'), Van Morrison ('Moondance') and Rea ('Josephine').

Having Sir Michael on the album cover will probably help sales along a bit, although albums of this nature are never really cause for cash register meltdowns.

But it's fine listening stuff and if you are scratching your head for something to put under the Christmas tree for the old folks then this is probably one of the better choices.