Michael Feinstein Celebrating Bobby Short is possibly Feinstein's best show to date, and more important, it is a buoyant musical salute to a buoyant musical legend.

Although Feinstein admits not knowing Short very well, he engagingly presents several personal anecdotes and many researched stories. What evolves is a heartfelt show of 16 tunes with the Short stamp of interpretative understanding. The songs were all well crafted with lyrical intricacies, like the internal rhymes in Cole Porter's "At Long Last Love," the lyric-laden, energetic "Can Can," and the ongoing stanzas of "I Can't Get Started" (Gershwin/Duke). Backed by musical director/pianist, John Oddo and a piping hot quintet, Feinstein belts and swings with all the jazzy ebullience this salute requires. The show has the eclectic span that Bobby Short's own shows reflected during his three decades-plus at the Cafe Carlyle. From the urbane "Isn't It A Pity" (Gershwins) to Arlen and Harburg's "Lydia, the Tattooed Lady," a lady with witty sexy messages within the body decor, there is also a healthy dose of Cole Porter, Short's favorite, and major influences like Duke Ellington with one of the Duke's lesser known songs, "C'est Comme Ca," an insouciant musical shrug, and the familiar "I Got It Bad and That Ain't Good."

"It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain't Got that Swing" has the swing; "Romance in the Dark" by Lil Green has the bluesy soul; as for Sondheim's killer ballad, "Losing My Mind," Short once said that no other song so strongly affected listeners. Since Bobby Short's repertoire reached back to the days of black songwriters like Fats Waller and James P. Johnson, Feinstein opens his show with a roistering "Guess Who's In Town," with the band swinging New Orleans spirit. Nattily dressed in a black velvet tuxedo jacket -- an appropriate stylish salute to the elegant Mr. Short -- Feinstein belts all the low-down spirit of the Johnson/Razaf tune and the audience could not love it more. Nor could they ask for a more tender show closer than "Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye" (Porter), the last vocal Bobby Short recorded, and which included Short's own voice.

During the run, Feinstein plans to bring in a guest to present a song linked with Bobby Short. Mary Cleere Haran's delivery was a heartfelt, lusty "Harlem on My Mind." Michael Feinstein Celebrating Bobby Short includes celebrating the best of the American songbook, with a nonstop parade of great songs and nonstop dash and ebullience. Even without the posters behind the stage, the presence of Bobby Short is palpable at Feinstein's these two weeks.

Michael Feinstein Celebrating Bobby Short at Feinstein’s at the Regency continues through June 16.

Elizabeth Ahlfors
Cabaret Scenes
June 6, 2007
www.cabaretscenes.org