Count without Group By

I have a working SQL statement that returns record information from a records table as well as the number of items in the items table linked to the records table. The Query looks like this:

SELECT mn_records.*, count(mn_items.parentRecord) AS [itemCount]
FROM mn_records, mn_items
WHERE mn_records.recordID = '01-0126500'
AND mn_items.parentRecord = '01-0126500'
GROUP BY mn_items.parentRecord, mn_records.recordID,
mn_records.title, mn_records.author, mn_records.publisher,
mn_records.imgURL, mn_records.descrip, mn_records.documentType,
mn_records.series, mn_records.gradeLevel, mn_records.language,
mn_records.length, mn_records.callNumber, mn_records.ISBN

It works fine and returns exactly what I want, but is there anyway to trim the GROUP BY statement? I'm not even sure why it's necessary, but the server chokes if it isn't there.

What do you mean by "TRIM" do you mean to include criteria by using "Having" or What?


S-