sinatra was meticulous about the quality of the sessions for "in the wee small hours". guitarist george van eps recalls that sinatra stopped a session after only singing a few notes because he felt his voice did not have "the right sound" at the time. the session was rescheduled for the following night, and van eps felt it "was perfect." sinatra also carefully sequenced the songs, with input from miller and riddle, for the lp he personally referred to as "the ava album."