Carmen McRae

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Originally Posted by Ian Thumwood
Bluesnik

Absolute rubbish - I would consider all these to be pretty excpetional jazz singers...

Bloody hell, Ian. I didn't know you wre still "lurking" around here, hanging in the corner like a big spider, waiting to pounce on (passing) people with your college notebook of long,medium and short lists and M&S blazer pocket full of coloured pens.

You should have a bell round your neck so you don't frighten the nervous.

Me, I have nerves of steel.

BN.

'Going to request John Lee Hooker's "Crawling Black Spider" for you on JRR (1960 Riverside with jazzy Sam Jones et Louis Hayes) AND, you left Joni Mitchell off your tip top "list", she likes jazz too.

[cloughie]

Originally Posted by Ian Thumwood
Bluesnik

Absolute rubbish - I would consider all these to be pretty excpetional jazz singers...

Bloody hell, Ian. I didn't know you wre still "lurking" around here, hanging in the corner like a big spider, waiting to pounce on (passing) people with your college notebook of long,medium and short lists and M&S blazer pocket full of coloured pens.

You should have a bell round your neck so you don't frighten the nervous.

Me, I have nerves of steel.

BN.

'Going to request John Lee Hooker's "Crawling Black Spider" for you on JRR (1960 Riverside with jazzy Sam Jones et Louis Hayes) AND, you left Joni Mitchell off your tip top "list", she likes jazz too.

Having Jaco as a sideman you'd have to - Don Juan's Wreckless Daughter is an excellent album as is the later Both Sides Now!

[Ian Thumwood]

The British jazz singer Julie Dunn appeared in a gig last week in the pub in a village about 3 miles down the road from where I live. Quite staggered to hear jazz this good in a village pub but her repertoire also included a couple of Joni Mitchell numbers and they proved to be the best songs of her set although one of the originals was really well thought out. Personally, I would much sooner hear someone play Joni Mitchell songs as oposed to the Broadway song book where some tunes should be pensioned off. Despite that, I wouldn't call her a jazz singer.

[handsomefortune]

i love watching mcrae's responses in this line up http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lsyzf...eature=related there's a bit of a clash going on ....

Underrated? , not with knowledgeable audiences, but in the current mainstream maybe.....?

in this context perhaps all of these names below are 'under rated', are often invisible. perhaps you can hear amy winehouse in this tune? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McfkH...wI&playnext=19

and maybe billy holiday in macy grey etc....component parts of overall approach and styles live on.

mcrae is quite something, 21,063+ youtube plays for some songs....so currently people 'like' her voice and persona!

here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8E82...wI&playnext=17 doing 'straight no chaser', which compared with the singers (below) creates interesting contrasts, useful as bench marks in time, objectives and styles....mcrae's approach to interpreting charlie parker, for instance, provides a few clues - especially in relation to the influence of jazz-pop. mcrae is an integral part of the sound of 'straight no chaser', but leaves the 'fiddley soloing' stuff to the other players including the drummer... , and instead plumbs for a stylistic experiment in vocal monotone, bass accompaniment and 'straight' speed. that's how i hear it and see it anyhew. therefore, i have my sympathies with bluesnik's perspective, on the subject of few 'jazz singers'. some listed upthread, have fusions going on, different objectives.... so perhaps the question is, is it necessary to have a purist approach, collude in a base line as far as a description of what 'a jazz singer' might sound like? i think it is necessary.

i find if you compare one specific popular song, you see different approaches to the same narrative, which reflects different objectives, interpretations and eras. uncannily, hoagy carmichael's tune and.paul fancis webster lyrics in 'baltimore oriole' are atmospheric but seedy. nevertheless delightful when immaculately well presented, they have a hot sort of down town monte carlo feel somehow..... that's where i imagine the narrative..... as well as in the baltimore snow.

who 'out sauces' who?

perhaps this jazz minamalist version is closest to mcrae in vocal range, spirit, and strength, persona, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorez_Alexandria rather than a more mainstream, or show biz approach? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vHFo6rd_9g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ua1vT...eature=related

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Merrilljazz at the whitehouse ....? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzWSc...eature=related

(sorry about the advert), but back to a minimalist approach of bass, drums and voice http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SJV_...eature=related

if mcrae recorded 'baltimore oriel', how would mcrae interpret webster's lyrics and carmichael's melodies, i wonder?

lastly, i'll just include this instrumental, because it's saturday morning http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtezMFupQJ4&
feature=related

workaday style, like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPzIh...eature=related

[handsomefortune]

benchmark composition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LaUH...eature=related

a long career span, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmen_McRae

Do you prefer singers who are off the note with questionable timing?

yes sometimes.

potentially, a subjective judgment revolving around taste?

an exploration of staple song, 'summertime' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Id6N...eature=related

[handsomefortune]

why not sing along with clifford brown?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lWO2r8jC9w

[Serial_Apologist]

I never liked Helen Merrill...

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

Helen Merrill is underrated [terrific posts handsome fortune ever so ta etc] ...

[handsomefortune]

more from my M&S blazer pocket full of coloured pens.

Those of you with longer memories might recall she was the subject of a
recently discontinued series called jazz library: my recommendations (and Christine Tobin's) here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00n13mq

having listened, a fabulous 'jazz library' , (on a par with 'pa pa jone's plus drummer guest' episode....(yes, that good))! guest christine tobin's contribution was excellent in terms of expressing a singer's perspective...

in general i could always do with more info on the network of songwriters who supplied artists like carmen mcrae with their material.

it's often obvious to see why some song narratives are perceived socially acceptable, and become popularised.....especially in the 'misery' (love, loss, desire) department, as selected from a comparatively small bunch of song writing collaborations old and new for people to sing. mysteriously absent from discussion is what the business arrangements of jazz artists actually were, their motivation for pursuing the specific direction they did, and ultimately for singing the songs they did.

even posthumously, it's still not info commonly discussed, though lorez alaexandria's 'last post' is pretty frank. http://www.jazzhouse.org/gone/lastpo...edit=992780014 i think she had a fantastic voice too.

the more spontaneous, and humorous mcrae became later in her career the more she was totally in keeping with many other uniquely hip women of the same era, some of whom also sang jazz. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeSeD...eature=related her 'inter song spiel' as a singer/ entertainer expresses mcrae's roots as a warm, liberated, jovial jamaican woman, a far cry from the gospel tinged beginnings, or the lonlieness, sadness of billy holiday songs.

imv mcrae would have been handy singing uptempo 60s brazillian jazz ...which seems to have its fair share of women singers with huge vocal ranges, of which they're usually determined to express the bottom end to the max! if a husky female smoker's voice could be digitised, as a studio effect, for instance used as liberally as auto tune currently is, i suspect it'd be very popular! (alyn and christine differed on this detail as regards mcrae's 'vocal progression', i thought)!

interpretations of popular standards can be notoriously limiting, especially coupled with the emphasis on physical appearance as dictated by the industry of a given era. but happily, mcrae is brilliant at forging a pretty unique and durable persona, bringing contemporary relevance, conversational sense, newness out of old song lyrics and arrangements way into the 80s. a superb communicator, for mcrae it's a question of when to embellish a given lyric with a swoop in on a melody....only for her to soar off again and ride a current of rhythm. her enunciation was pretty good and imv mcrae's definitive vocal range is matched by a capability in expressing a really wide emotional range simultaneously.

perhaps the odd thing about sounding 'effortless' when you sing, is that it bores some people............ they usually complain that (it's not difficult enough)? yet on the other hand, christine tobin's point about mcrae being 'in side the engine room' of the music was so apt....logically, how can that really be 'effortless'? it's the fact that mcrae's more than comfortable in the engine room, that makes her 'a great jazz singer', that combined with her musical heritage, having known so many jazz legends. mcrae sounds serious, like she's interested in furthering what jazz singing women might sound like.

mcrae's singing career existed at that exciting point when abbey lincoln and max roach are giving jazz a political edge. happily, this specific militancy resurfaces, re emerges in mcrae's later material imo. comparatively, just to return to lorez alexandria, (as mentioned upthread), who expresses a similar knowing, and militancy in her interpretation of 'baltimore oriole' lyrics, as re1eased in 1978.

lorez alexandria also has great emotional and vocal range ... sang some quite unusual songs. perhaps mcrae's 'thelonius monk album' wasn't necessarily her 'wildest desire'.... but someone else's?! christine tobin didn't like a track from it iirc....personally, i wish carmen mcrae had taken a risk on some different song writers?! maybe if she'd have sang this song linked, she'd sing these words even better than lorez alexandria did...... which would take some doing.. but i'd love to hear it by both.... two songs on this utube, both sung by lorez alexandria .... it's the second song that i'd love to have heard carmen mcrae sing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpVdLwC3fE4

somehow, i would also love to hear both lorez and carmen sing this one, from 1966 'dig everything' sung by a cockney madcap called dave ...lyrics that sum up an era, and the beginning of dave's career. rather than having to wait, as mcrae did, till later in her career to publicly 'misbehave' on stage, and at a live recording! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xrah1k0sLj4

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

thanks handsomefortune Lorez Alexander is completely new to me [how did that happen] ....