A couple of months ago our friends Karen and Bob suggested
we join them at Del Ray’s Arts Garage where Ann Hampton Callaway was performing. As much as I love the Great American Songbook,
memories of a parking nightmare in Delray made me hesitant to go. That experience is a story onto itself, not
worth going into here. Easy, they said,
we’ll drive and park, so we said you’re on.
The indoor parking garage was full to the third level but
there Bob found a space. No doubt, I
thought, if I drove, it wouldn’t be there and I’d end up driving around in
circles as I did one evening in Delray (ok, I said I wouldn’t go into it, but
the memory lingers on).
The Arts Garage performance venue has been configured
into a cabaret, six to a table, bring your own food and drink. Karen supplied a delicious cream and fruit
tart for dessert and Ann brought the wine (coffee for me).
My seat was ideal (thanks Karen!); with a full view of
the piano, a Kawai Grand.
You rarely see a Kawai being used professionally, the instrument of
choice usually being a Steinway or a Yamaha.
I have a Yamaha baby grand which I love, but I almost bought a Kawai as
I think it has a brighter sound, so ideally suited for playing The Great
American Songbook.
As I said, we were seated at a table for six and our two
other tablemates turned out to be a man who we used to watch on NYC TV years
ago, Bill Boggs, who had an interview show with some of the entertainment
greats, and to this day does a professional speaking tour discussing those
people, so watching the Diva perform with Bill and his partner, Jane was serendipitous. This is how I remember him way back when we
were in NYC, a photo of him interviewing Chuck Berry.
We’ve seen other great Divas in a cabaret setting before,
and three special ones spring to mind, including a rare US appearance at the Colony by perhaps the greatest living female jazz singer, Stacey Kent.
Unfortunately, it was at a time before I had a smart
phone and did not have a camera on me, but seeing her and meeting her was a
thrill. She’s been called the “Frank
Sinatra” of divas, because of her unique way of phrasing a song. Her husband backs her up on the sax but does
not overwhelm her. If she ever returns
to Florida or to NYC while we are in that area, we will be there.
We also saw another fabulous Diva at the Colony, Jane Monheit,
who has a distinctive style and great range with her voice. She too performs with a back up group headed
by her husband on drums.
When we lived in New York we were lucky enough to go over
to a small Supper Club on the Upper East Side and there we sat right at a
front table, mesmerized by the jazz legend, the late, great Carmen McCrea. I think I have all her CDs. Jazz doesn’t get any better than that. She too was backed by a combo she probably worked
with for years.
Of course we’ve seen other singers, Keely Smith at the
Colony once, but usually on stage in an auditorium, as we once saw Ann Hampton
Callaway at the Eissey Campus Theatre of Palm Beach State College many years
ago. She was accompanist by, arguably,
the most original jazz pianist today, Bill Mays. There is a world of difference, however,
between a stage performance and cabaret.
The obvious difference is the intimacy created, resulting
in the give and take between the performer and the audience. One feeds on the other. You get the sense that we’re all part of the
Great American Songbook “family.” And it
is a family that loves its progenitors, the composers, the lyricists, the performers
who have stylized this great body of music.
Ann Hampton Callaway preserves and has become part of
this wonderful tradition in her program “Jazz Goes to the Movies.” Her program fully realizes the breadth of the
great songs which emerged from film. In
addition to the obvious ones, there are endless streams of classics that have
come from lesser watched films, such as "This Time the Dream's on Me"
by Harold Arlen, and lyrics by Johnny Mercer for the 1941 film “Blues in the
Night,” just one of the many songs sung by Callaway during her two part
performance.
Her song selection was broad. I wrote them all down, but I’ll only mention
a few of the 18 (yes, 18!) songs she sang.
Naturally, I’m going to focus on some I love to play on the piano
myself.
This has to be at the top of the list, the not often
performed song by Henry Mancini with lyrics by Leslie Bricusse, “Two for the
Road.” Undoubtedly she chose to perform
this wonderful song, I think Mancini’s best, because the co star of the film of
the same title, the actor so many of us watched “grow up” on film from his
first performance in “Tom Jones,” Albert Finney had just passed away. This is the same song which Ann (my Ann) and I chose to “perform” at our son’s wedding last August, me at the piano and Ann
reading (as, unfortunately, my Ann can’t sing – and neither can I) the
evocative lyrics, so appropriate for Jonathan and his bride, Tracie.
We hung onto every word as Callaway lovingly performed
this number.
I interject an important observation here regarding her
performance, unique among the cabaret divas I mentioned above, and that is she
accompanied herself on the piano. I
mentioned above the Kawai piano. I guess
I simply expected a pianist and a bass player to come out to accompany
her. Oh, it is so, so much better when a
great singer and pianist are one. Her
piano chops may not be in the league of a Bill Mays, but in accompanying herself,
she is able to ring out every drop of emotion from The Great American
Songbook. It’s as if her piano and voice
are but one instrument, in perfect harmony and symmetry.
Her opening number, “From this Moment On” demonstrated
her remarkable range, her smoky voice, and her ability to scat. During another number, again one of the strengths
of a cabaret setting, was taking the audience through a scat lesson and we
found ourselves scatting along with her.
Really fun stuff.
Another diversion, about a third of the way through her
program, she finally noticed a man in a front table and she was somewhat
startled, saying, “Oh, my ex husband is here!”
Well, that got the audience’s attention, and from that point on, there
were some very funny, but harmless jabs sent his way by Callaway. She knows how to work an audience, including
giving attribution to our table mate, Bill Boggs.
She incorporates all styles in her piano accompaniment,
from a bluesy feeling playing and singing “As Time Goes By” and some bouncing boogie-woogie
in her tribute to Fred Astaire (she knows his sister) in “Let’s Face the Music
and Dance.”
Her jazz sensibility on the piano came out in “This Can’t
be Love,” again demonstrating her incredible voice range.
One of my favorites when I play the piano is “Folks Who
Live on the Hill,” by Jerome Kern, and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II from the 1937
film “High, Wide, and Handsome.” But,
oh, my heart be still listening to Callaway play and sing this song, channeling
Peggy Lee with whom the song is closely associated.
Her rendition of “At Last” Etta James's signature song
but more recently Beyoncé Knowles’ “big song” demonstrated the power of
Callaway’s voice. Rarely does a singer
have the gift of the subtle and power as well.
It was breathtaking.
Callaway is not only a performer, but a composer as well,
and those skills were put on full display in a playful impromptu performance she
composed and sung on the spot taking silly suggestions from the audience; a blind
man, a pizza maker, meets a woman who makes burrata, they make love on the
beach in Del Ray in a one night stand, where they lose their clothes while
swimming, the details not being important other than her ability to compose in
real time. She also jokingly “tuned” her
voice to the piano, easily singing a half step below or above a note to display
her voice control and musical sensibilities.
