This album is supposedly inspired by Liza and her piano parties wherein she and her guests would sit around a piano and just...sing. I have actually heard from a number of people who have been to her parties and they say that she is very much at home with intimate singing with thoughtful interpretations of the Great American Songbook. On her recent Oprah interview, she has said that she considers herself a "modern vaudevillian," and I agree but I think people forget that she is also a singer. I know her voice isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I have always loved it: it has a lot of personality, it's robust, sort of a more modern (at that time) version of her mother's. Well, nowadays , it's more old-fashioned but never dated.
She has done this kind of album before ("Gently") but this one seems more cohesive, better, just more...Liza. This stems from the perfect arrangements and accompaniment by the wondrous Billy Stritch. It's happy, melancholy, spare, trio, everything you want in an album of standards. And even though her mannerisms show up once in a while (the need to bombast, the "shhhh") it never distracts because you always feel like she feels the songs, and the lyrics. Yes, her voice isn't what it was, but this album still draws from all its strengths. And the song selection - divine! My favorite is the contemplative "On Such A Night Like This, " (where she pays tribute to her own mother) but every other song is just as great. And she proves that she can make even such an iconic song as "At Last" her own. Of course, she sings one of my favorite songs of all time, "I Got Lost In His Arms," so that's a plus.
So excuse me as I look at the cloudy evening sky, and get lost in Liza's voice, right now, I can't ask for anything more...
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