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Woman Around Town’s Editor Charlene Giannetti and writers for the website talk with the women and men making news in New York, Washington, D.C., and other cities around the world. Thanks to Ian Herman for his wonderful piano introduction.

La Tanya Hall

Mabel’s Babies – An American Songbook Competition

02/06/2018

Background

Adela and Larry Elow, long banner-carrying supporters of American Songbook in the put-your-money-where-your-heart-is vein *, have generously endowed The Mabel Mercer Foundation with a $50,000 fund created specifically to encourage teenagers to learn and perform The Great American Songbook over the next decade. The Foundation calls these young people “Mabel’s Babies”- in reference to namesake, the iconic (childless) Mabel Mercer.

As defined by Larry, this means “material composed between the years 1900-1970 – songs that formed the essence of America’s three great interrelated musical gifts to the world: Jazz, Popular Song, and the Modern Musical Theater.” When the couple were respectively coming of age, Adela recalls, “…These songs expressed the ethos, character and values of what came to be known as The Greatest Generation: the romance, grace, sensitivity, idealism and all those other life attitudes that we took for granted.”

Larry tells me he had to be convinced of the enterprise by his more optimistic soul mate. Imagine what it must be like for those who have lived through (and loved ) eras when the milkman and debutantes were familiar with the same songs, when fans bought sheet music, families gathered around radios, couples went dancing, nightclubs and movie musicals proliferated.

Adela and Larry Elow

Put yourselves in the shoes of a man who became a songwriter and musician in order to immerse himself and contribute to the genre as he watched venues close, popularity/ awareness diminish… Imagine the frustration of talking to young people – especially performers – unfamiliar with Berlin, Gershwin, Porter, Kern…who might never have heard the Songbook were it not for Paul McCartney or Rod Stewart. Fortunately, Larry Elow has the determined Adela to sway his counter intuitive reserve. One couldn’t imagine a more symbiotic team.

The first part of the Elow’s heat-seeking “Teenager Endowment Fund,” titled Songs Were Made to Sing While We’re Young, were tapped on February 3, 2018 at the supportive Laurie Beechman Theatre.  Adolescents chosen from Fiorello H. LaGuardia School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, Frank Sinatra School of the Arts, Talent Unlimited High School, and the Professional Performing Arts School (with a program run by Rosie’s Kids), will compete before an audience for a first, second and third prize of $2500, $1500, and $1000 meant to further study. Origin schools are not identified in order to maintain lack of prejudice.

The winner will also be given the opportunity to perform October 2018 during the foundation’s annual New York Cabaret Convention.

Judges

David Finkle, La Tanya Hall, Jim Morgan, Jeff Harnar, Deborah Grace Winer

I asked each of the judges (beforehand) to describe the qualities of a good cabaret performer. Here’s what they’re respectively hoping to find.

Village Voice/Huffington Post commentator David Finkle: A good cabaret performer should have:  1. A personality 2. Respect for lyrics  3. A reason for singing the songs he/she has chosen  4. Impressing the audience with your voice is not as important as entertaining them

Cabaret Entertainer/ Director- Jeff Harnar: The last thing a good cabaret artist needs to have is a good singing voice.  Everything else is essential: a point of view, specificity, intimacy, humor, wisdom, creativity, vulnerability, the gift of storytelling in song and a compelling enough personality to hold an audience for an hour. If you have all that and a good singing voice, that’s cabaret heaven for me.

Cabaret/Jazz Vocalist La Tanya Hall: The most impactful singers are ones who sing to EXPRESS, not IMPRESS. In all music, we must be storytellers and not be so concerned with sound production. Take me on an honest journey, and you have a fan for life.

Producing Director of The York Theater Jim Morgan: My idea of a good cabaret performer is someone whose confident knowledge of the song being performed is evident from their presentation, who is able to connect with an audience through a unique point of view. Ideally, a cabaret artist takes the song in a new direction while honoring the original intent of its creator(s).

Author/Historian/Artistic Director Deborah Grace Winer: What I look for in any cabaret performer is someone who can communicate to an audience a personal point of view on a song, telling a story filtered through his or her own perspective and life experience–with musicality, talent, taste and craft. And always, allowing the song itself to be paramount.

KT Sullivan, Artistic Director of The Mabel Mercer Foundation and Vocalist sums it up with: It’s all about telling stories.

On the 118th anniversary of Mabel Mercer’s passing, the competition featured 16 teenagers ranging from 15 to a venerable 19. Each was given a single opportunity with which to show the judges what he/she had to offer. A wide variety of songs from musical theater and traditional songbook were offered.

“It’s through the performances of young people that these songs will live for the next hundred years.” Adela Elow. Hope springs eternal.

*Adela and Larry Elow additionally founded and helm, to date, 26 years of concerts at the Caramoor estate in Katonah, New York and annually underwrite the Donald F. Smith Award presented at The New York Cabaret Convention.

The Winners

Christina Jiminez

First Prize Winner Christina Jimenez chooses to share Kander & Ebb’s “Sing Happy” (Flora the Red Menace). The vocalist starts low key which gives her time to slowly build emotion. Surety and skill keep lyrics surging without going over the top. Like immutable waves in a smooth surf, she holds balance=focus and brightness, even as keys shift. Chills run up my spine.

The very personable Jimenez tells me she discovered American Songbook at PPAS (Professional Performing Arts School) on a musical theater trajectory at 15.“I knew it was there, I just never sang it myself.” She particularly enjoys telling stories. Cabaret, the young woman wisely observes, allows one to personalize a song instead of bending to its context. Cristina is enthusiastic about this new fount of material. “There were songs I heard today that I want to take a look at.” I found her particularly well grounded, a quality that will serve. Her check will go towards college.

Hannah-Jane Peterson

Second Prize Winner Hannah-Jane Peterson delivers a fully (self) staged version of “The Joint Is Really Jumpin’ at Carnegie Hall” (Blaine/Martin/Edens) sung by Judy Garland in Thousands Cheer. Beginning atop the piano, ostensibly bored with accompanist Jon Weber, Peterson is clearly a multifaceted talent. Movement during the boogie woogie chorus is fluid and appealing. Vocal not only sounds swell, but is infused with period attributes; brief scat is a bullseye.

Peterson, also from PPS, tells me she and her now single mother relocated from West Virginia two years ago to facilitate pursuing Hannah’s aspirations. Against all odds, she secured an agent who sends her out for voice-over work, but knows that at 17, she might have to wait on “legitimate” theater. (She’s made other appearances.) The young woman grew up with musicals and standards. She’s always been a Golden Age fan “it’s so relatable…” A junior looking at Pace, Marymount, and Circle in The Square, her determination, impatience and zeal make me think of the character Molly Brown (as in unsinkable). Part of Hannah’s check will go to new dance shoes, the rest towards college.

Naomi Autumn Steele

Third Prize Winner Naomi Autumn Steele (Talented Unlimited High School) applies her fetching voice to “Gorgeous” (Bock & Harnick- The Apple Tree). Without knowledge of the song’s context – Ella’s pleasure and surprise at having been transformed by her fairy godmother, this unique interpretation portrays a woman’s expressing an “obnoxious” (Steele) opinion of herself. The vocalist is a little stiff onstage.

Steele is an opera student who took a flier with this competition. Both knowledge and ambitions lie in that sector. “I chose this song because it had kind of the same color and range that I have…I like to sing lyrics that make me feel good. It’s a confidence booster to sing I’m gorgeous.”  The young woman says she concentrates so much on her classical music, she forgets there are other genres she can explore. A window was opened here. (Eileen Farrell interpreted standards after a career in opera. Songbook stylists Sylvia McNair and Tammy McCann were also operatically trained.) A senior who aspires to Ithaca College, her check is going into a bank account.

Other Stand-Outs

James Steinman Gordon; Isiah Feil-Sharp

In my opinion the best male performers are 15 year-old James Steinman-Gordon and Isiah Feil-Sharp. Gordon offered Lerner & Lowe’s “On the Street Where You Live” (My Fair Lady) with besotted expression appropriate to young Freddy Eynsford-Hill. His ballad is melodious, emphasis well placed, swell admirably restrained. Unfortunately, the young man never looks at his audience. Feil-Sharp has us from the moment he insouciantly leans against the wall. “Luck Be A Lady” (Frank Loesser- Guys and Dolls) arrives with spit, polish, and theatricality. The vocalist is street cool/credible. He connects as if coolly challenging dispute. Gestures are spot-on.

Annie Ross and Angelina Hairston

Of the women, Annie Ross and Angelina Hairston are striking. Ross renders Rodgers & Hart’s “Falling in Love with Love” (The Boys From Syracuse), immediately assuming character, immediately connecting with the audience. Gestures are meaningful for being minimal. Phrasing makes theatrical sense. Ross stresses a bit on high notes, but that’s just practice…and octave choice. Hairston’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’” (Waller/Razaf) emerges like slow hip rotation. “What do I care?” issues plaintive. With “I’m home about eight” she charmingly taps her watch. Octaves slip slide with skill and comprehension of the period. Open your eyes please.

Juliette Papadopoulos’ “If I Loved You” (Rodgers & Hammerstein – Carousel) showcases a lovely, legit voice and fine control. The song is perhaps beyond real life experience, however, which diminishes impact. Kerlin Pyun’s cute “I Can Cook” (Comden & Green/ Bernstein –  On the Town) evidences great feeling for and ability with swing. The performer needs to moooove however, to sell the otherwise infectious song. She doesn’t have enough fun. Neither of these contestants look at the audience.

In general, the biggest issues after musicality are relating to people out front and choosing material that’s viscerally understood/and or appropriate to experience.

Joie Bianco

Somewhat of an exception to the last caveat is Joie Bianco, the youngest winner of Mabel Mercer Foundation’s Julie Wilson Award (at 16) and still a student at Talent Unlimited High School. The artist is preternaturally mature on stage managing not just graciousness/warmth and all important connection, but a knack for believably finding herself in songs for which one might otherwise require more maturity.

Bianco is aware of what she’s singing, not just how. She has a captivating voice and fine control. From the apt “I’m Just Too Young to Sing the Blues” (Charles Nater Jones/ /Chuck Meyer) – the last “blues” is, I think, sung in ten syllables, to Styne/Merrill’s iconic “People,” Bianco sets an example to other young performers. (Jon Weber-piano)

KT Sullivan, Artistic Director of The Mabel Mercer Foundation, offers diverse thanks, in particular to the teachers behind the aspiring artistsHeidi Best, Carl Johnson, Jeff Statile, and Bret Kristofferson. Her pristine a cappella verse of “While We’re Young” (Wilder/Engvick) follows…Songs are meant to sing while we’re young… Adela and Larry quietly sing along.

The program’s benefactors are pleased and, I think, moved. Adela Elow comments she’s glad she’s not a judge and advises the young people to learn, study, perform, and follow their dreams. Larry Elow says he’s sorry he gave Adela such a hard time and now has hope.

The crowd is buoyant. Tune in next year. Meanwhile support American Songbook.

Pianist Jason Andrews accompanied students from Frank Sinatra School of the Arts. Pianist John Pristiani accompanied students from Fiorello H. LaGuardia School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. Jon Weber accompanied students from Professional Performing Arts School

Photos by Maryann Lopinto
Opening: Naomi Steele, Hannah Peterson, Cristina Jiminez, KT Sullivan, Adela Elow, Larry Elow

Listen to Alix Cohen talk about covering theater on WAT-CAST.

Catherine Russell: Sunny Side of the Street

04/20/2016

Catherine Russell’s latest concert for Jazz at Lincoln Center was apparently “thirty years in the making.” Both a celebration of composer/arranger/bandleader Sy Oliver and an appreciation of Russell’s mother, Carline Ray, for 70 years an innovative jazz singer and musician, the evening is clearly a labor of love. We hear numbers from Oliver’s tenure with the Jimmie Lunceford orchestra and selections rearranged for, and performed by his vocalist wife, Lillian Clark, first with The Sentimentalists and then for The Lillian Clark Trio which included Ray and young Catherine herself.

Though Russell has presented isolated selections from the original show, up to now, she hasn’t had the opportunity to offer a large number of the swing songs as originated by the group. Tonight, joined by Carolyn Leonhart and La Tanya Hall with pristine harmony, impeccable phrasing, and infectious pleasure, the artist realizes her dream.

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Mike Munisteri, Catherine Russell, Tal Ronen, Evan Arntzen

We begin with a musical rendition of Irving Berlin’s “Mandy” ebulliently swung by the terrific band in an arrangement by Jon-Erik Kelso. Kelso’s solos throughout support his reputation for sparkling clarity and invigorated swing. The entire room grins. A happy-go-lucky, crisply articulated “My Blue Heaven” (Walter Donaldson/ George A. Whiting) follows. “I used to sing the top part, now I’m singin’ the bottom,” Russell quips.

“Don’t Blame Me (for falling in love with you)” (Jimmy McHugh/Dorothy Fields) evokes a USO dance from the forties. It’s slow enough so that awkward soldiers won’t step on their partner’s feet too much. The trio is complicit, not a musical thread dangles. It’s as if they’d been doing this together for years. “Say It Isn’t So” (Irving Berlin) delivers swaying, textured harmony hand in hand with John Allred’s polished, wah-wah trombone. Vocal solos are cottony; sincere.

trio

Mark Shane, Carolyn Leonhart, La Tanya Hall, Catherine Russell

Oliver’s arrangement of a medley from Oklahoma! bears his signature stamp. Familiar songs sound blithe and fresh as swing. Vocalists emerge and retreat back into the group with fluency, sometimes warmly acknowledging one another. Guitarist Matt Munisteri provides subtle underpinning.

A 1950 version of the 1927 “Ain’t She Sweet?” (Milton Ager/Jack Yellen) with Evan Arntzen’s here doodling saxophone is hip and happy. …Cast an eye in that direction/Dig that child from fore to aft…Arntzen is this evening’s discovery. Russell calls him an old man in a young body. The musician plays superb sax, clarinet and flute exhibiting a preternatural understanding of the period and stylistic savvy.

“Opus One” (Sy Oliver/ Sid Garris) is the epitome of harmonic vocal swing, playful and bubbly. “It’s The Talk of the Town” (Jerry Livingston/Al J. Neiburg/Marty Symes), on the other hand, is so shadowy, even consonants seem airbrushed. Vocals dip and rise like scallops. Munisteri again embroiders.

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Catherine Russell (behind: Mark McLean, Evan Arntzen, Jon-Erik Kelso

Russell also offers solos.  I Know a Little Bit About a Lotta Things/But “I Don’t Know Enough About You,” popularized by its author, Peggy Lee, is eeezzzeee. Lyric lines have fading tails so that each connects to the next without a gap. The song arrives unfussy, conversational. Louis Armstrong’s “Give Me a Kiss to Build a Dream On,” with lush, muted trombone, begins the mellow, lilting, slow dance we know, builds to a burlesque stroll, and ends emphatic.

“T’Aint What You Do (It’s the Way That You Do It)”written by Oliver with Trummy Young for Ella Fitzgerald is performed with call/response, vocal to horns, then vocal to vocal: the band speak/sings in unison. “I’ve been waitin’ to ask them to sing somethin’ for a long time. They weren’t overjoyed, but…” Russell wryly tells us. Vocal is brighter here, more open-throated. The performer taps her right foot, then steps side to side in her inimitable, refined, I-can’t-help-but-move-a-bit manner.

Oliver’s arrangement of “On the Sunny Side of The Street” (Jimmy McHugh/ Dorothy Fields) was a big hit for Tommy Dorsey. Jaunty and light with Kelso’s trumpet in tangy, rasp mode, the song leaves the room awash in high spirits.

The three vocalists should come together again. Their sound is catnip.

Also featuring: Mark Shane-piano, Tal Ronen-bass, Mark McLean-drums

April 15, 2016- Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Appel Room

Photos by Frank Stewart
Opening: The Band

Witchcraft – The Jazz Magic of Cy Coleman – Sparkling

03/22/2016

Most fans know composer/songwriter/pianist Cy Coleman (Seymour Kaufman 1929-2004) as an author of such musical theater successes as Sweet Charity, Barnum, and The Will Rodgers Follies. In fact, the classically trained child prodigy was drawn to popular music, particularly jazz, penning dozens upon dozens of songs recorded by iconic vocalists.

Guest Artistic Director Billy Stritch (piano/vocals) is a natural and fortuitous choice to helm this program. Co-written with the knowledgeable Andy Propst, author of You Fascinate Me So: The Life and Times of Cy Coleman, narrative is warm and illuminating. Not only is Stritch a superb performer/musician/arranger, but he briefly knew Coleman and is able to share his own affectionate and respectful experience of the man. The sum total is top flight entertainment. (Stritch should do this more often.)

“Tin Pan Alley,” written with Coleman’s first collaborator Joseph McCarthy, Jr., is a dancey valentine to the business: …where music with a lyric/has caused a dizzy mirac-le…It’s Jolson singing Mammy/ that put the A in Alabamy…Stritch’s solo does it charming justice. His “I’ll Be Coming Back” (Al Stillman) shows the mercurial musician’s hip, Philip Marlowe side and facility with tonight’s celebrated genre.

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La Tanya Hall

Also written with McCarthy, “Why Try to Change Me Now?” is rendered by La Tanya Hall with a satiny voice skating just above circling brushes. Hall intermittently looks at the audience as if she’s in an intimate club and can see faces. This is immensely engaging. Later, her interpretation of “Sweet Talk” (Floyd Huddleston) manages to be pissed off without sounding abrasive. The vocalist has a husky purr she uses to fine effect.

In addition to McCarthy, we hear songs for which Coleman partnered with such as Carolyn Leigh (a fruitful, but tempestuous collaboration during which some songs were legendary for the spontaneity and speed with which they were created), Dorothy Fields, Peggy Lee, Floyd Huddleston, Buddy Greco, and Marilyn and Alan Bergman.

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Nicolas King

In his Y debut, Nicolas King presents “I Walk a Little Faster” (Carolyn Leigh) with appealing phrasing that includes a minute pause after “walk” a little faster, one between keep and bumping into walls…and a little laugh at nothing but disaster…as if he can’t control his behavior.

King, like Hall, looks at faces. In some ways, we’ve watched him grow up onstage (since age 11). Probably a reincarnated member of The Rat Pack, it’s good to see the artist channel his decisive flair into more restrained delivery. Even during the dense, bracing “You Wanna Bet” (Dorothy Fields), he moves around the stage vocally swinging without overt flamboyance.

The jaunty “Doodling Song” is performed, with inviting vocal arrangement, by Stritch, King, and Gabrielle Stravelli. Stritch first heard the captivating number on The Dick Van Dyke Show. Another group selection featuring Debby Boone, Gabrielle Stravelli, and Hall, “Bouncing Back For More,” was bumped from successive Broadway musicals only to have its first public outing on a television special with Lucille Ball and Shirley MacLaine. The snappy trio is enhanced by cute, synchronized movement. (Both Carolyn Leigh)

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Gabrielle Stravelli

Stravelli showcases quiet intensity and expert control with “Rules Of the Road:” So these are the ropes,/The tricks of the trade,/The rules of the road…She’s grave, resigned, bummed out and refined. (Carolyn Leigh) During “Sweet Talk” (Floyd Huddleston), the artist’s focus makes it seem as if thoughts are coming to her for the first time.

She and Hall also present an inviting duet of “Cheatin’” (Marilyn and Alan Bergman), part of a Song Cycle called “Portraits of Jazz.” Stritch tells us this is “a tribute to the nightclub scene when Coleman was coming up.” The wry lyric finds Hall as “his” mistress singing to “his” wife:  I always thought that when he wasn’t with me, he must’ve been home with you. Apparently the musician has been two timing both of them. He works out every morning/Two shows a night/Plus that son of a bitch/ Is cheating on us…The ladies bond in betrayal and incredulity. Both vocalists enact the scenario with effective spirit.

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Billy Stritch and Debby Boone

Debby Boone shines with “Here I Go Again” (Tommy Wolf) which sails by like a delicate milkweed pod on a light breeze, the unknown, “Pink Taffeta Sample Size Ten” (Dorothy Fields-cut from Sweet Charity) in which she inhabits girlish awe with porcelain clarity, and “I’m Gonna Laugh You Right Out of My Life” (Joseph McCarthy, Jr. for a musicalization of The Heartbreak Kid) which is delivered with melancholy bitterness.

An unexpected vocal turn by bassist Jay Leonhart gives us the amusing “The Laarge Daark Aardvaark Song” –misspelling intentional- (Alan Sherman of “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh” fame.) Anyone who’s heard Leonhart scat won’t be surprised he’s a master of cool understatement.

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Billy Stritch

Billy Stritch’s pristine version of “It Amazes Me” (Carolyn Leigh), the show’s denouement, is slow and savored; surprised, grateful, abashed, and rather moving.

Stage Direction by Scott Faris suits both material and performers to a T.

Somewhere Mr. Coleman is beaming.

Performance Photos by Richard Termine
Opening: Billy Stritch, Debby Boone, Nicolas King, Gabrielle Stravelli, La Tanya Hall

92Y Lyrics & Lyricists presents
Witchcraft- The Jazz Magic of Cy Coleman
Billy Stritch Artistic Director
Andy Propst- Co-Writer
Scott Faris- Stage Director
Featuring  Debby Boone, La Tanya Hall, Nicolas King, Gabrielle Stravelli
Jay Leonhart-Bass, Rick Montalbano-Drums
92Y  Lexington Avenue 
NEXT: Everything’s Coming Up Ethel-The Ethel Merman Songbook  April 16-18