Lorna Dallas- Snapshots – Virtuosity

Lorna Dallas is a lady. This is not to say she’s distant – in fact, vulnerability is particularly appealing – or conservative, but rather that the artist is innately elegant. Her shows are like gourmet meals, carefully curated for sequence, aesthetics, taste, and overall message. Snapshots, with intermittent reference to particular personal photos=moments in time, is an intimate experience, sometimes moving, at others, winking fun.

(There’s) “Always Something There to Remind Me” (Burt Bacharach/Hal David) is made sophisticated with this arrangement and phrasing; more heartache than casual note. “Walking Among My Yesterdays” (John Kander/Fred Ebb): Was it really all that sweet/In that house, along that street…arrives as if recalling in real time with pauses while imagination paints.

Several jaunty music hall songs refer back to the artist’s British home. “London, Dear Old London” (Jerome Kern/PG Wodehouse 1922) is a variety number. Dallas strolls with casual flair, a boulevardier missing only her parasol. “Flash, Bang, Wallop” (David Heneker) dances in crisp and winking: Flash, bang, wallop, what a picture/What a picture, what a photograph… Um-tiddly-um-pum-um-pum-pum/Stick it in your fam’ly album…. Vaudeville lightly bobs and weaves. Christopher Denny adds to vocal.

Jerry Herman’s “Song On the Sand” intoxicates. The savored lyric feels personal. Audience collectively breathes more slowly. An infectiously ebullient “Waltz of My Heart” (Ivor Novello) segues into “Waltz in Swingtime” (Jerome Kern/Dorothy Fields/Barry Kleinbort). Dallas’s luminous soprano has melodic acumen.

Also from Novello, “Paris Reminds Me of You” transitions into “The Last Time I Saw Paris” performed with indelible yearning. Filigree piano conjures fallen blossoms on wet streets. (Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II) From Travels in Vermeer, a musical-in-progress by Barry Kleinbort, we hear the debut of “Stillness.” : There she is, half a room away… What is it that draws me/Stillness, not emptiness/This stillness makes me feel alive…And I’m wondering what she’d say if we’d find a way…’Evocative, quiet, haunting; respectful.

“Stranger in Paradise” (Robert Wright/George Forrest), in crystalline English (like an aria) and showgirl German, alights with a droll anecdote about taking too many jobs at the same time. “Simple” (Maury Yeston) and “Take the Moment” (Richard Rodgers/Stephen Sondheim) combine as enduring wisdom. Dallas sings with the full weight of realized life. ‘Hear this!’ she almost articulates. Vocal thrills. “Once In a Blue Moon” (Jerome Kern/Anne Caldwell) contains the message of “Hello Young Lovers.” The artist shares with a full heart.

A beautiful show.

Photos by Alix Cohen

Lorna Dallas – Snapshots
Director – Barry Kleinbort
MD/Piano – Christopher Denny

ALSO NOVEMBER 3, 2024

Chelsea Table and Stage
152 West 26th Street

About Alix Cohen (1868 Articles)
Alix Cohen is the recipient of ten New York Press Club Awards for work published on this venue. Her writing history began with poetry, segued into lyrics and took a commercial detour while holding executive positions in product development, merchandising, and design. A cultural sponge, she now turns her diverse personal and professional background to authoring pieces about culture/the arts with particular interest in artists/performers and entrepreneurs. Theater, music, art/design are lifelong areas of study and passion. She is a voting member of Drama Desk and Drama League. Alix’s professional experience in women’s fashion fuels writing in that area. Besides Woman Around Town, the journalist writes for Cabaret Scenes, Broadway World, TheaterLife, and Theater Pizzazz. Additional pieces have been published by The New York Post, The National Observer’s Playground Magazine, Pasadena Magazine, Times Square Chronicles, and ifashionnetwork. She lives in Manhattan. Of course.