Cecile McLorin Salvant: The Addition
Cecile McLorin Salvant
The Addition, San Francisco, CA, November 12, 2014
Reviewed by Steve Murray for Cabaret Scenes
Jazz’s new wunderkind, the ridiculously talented Cecile McLorin Salvant, can blow your mind in just her opening number. Jerome Kern/Otto Harbach’s “Yesterdays” becomes a jazz frolic with Salvant’s penchant for emphasizing and playing with different vocal annunciations that take the listener on a joyous ride. She travels multiple keys in one bar, grunts and howls and generously allows pianist Aaron Diehl, bassist Paul Sikivie and percussionist Lawrence Leathers opportunities to fly.
Her phrasing reminds me of Carmen McRae and it’s astonishing what Salvant can do with her voice on “What a Little Moonlight Can Do” and the Bert Williams signature song “Nobody.” Rodgers & Hart’s “I Didn’t Know What Time It Was” never sounded like this, driven by an incredible bass backbeat; Salvant uses varying vocal styles to play with the melody. Similarly, her take on the racially sensitive “You Bring Out the Savage in Me” and Blanche Calloway’s “Growlin’ Dan” are showcases of unique vocal stylings that are sublime to hear. The trio has worked together for years and it shows. There’s a seamless intuitiveness musically with arrangements so tight they take your breath away. The unit as a whole seems like a solid symbiotic entity raising each tune to a very high standard.
Salvant loves to have fun, exhibited in her inclusion of Bacharach & David’s marital advice song “Wives and Lovers,” which today seems ridiculously sexist, and Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Stepsisters’ Lament” from Cinderella. Her interpretation of Sondheim’s “Send in the Clowns,” delivered slow and measured, was transcendent. At this point in her young career (she’s only 25), Savlant can do pretty much anything she puts her mind to. It’s exciting to contemplate the possibilities.
Category: Cabaret Reviews, Regional, San Francisco, San Francisco Cabaret Reviews
