Michael Feinstein: Happy Holidays: Swinging with the Big Band

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Michael Feinstein

Happy Holidays: Swinging with the Big Band

Birdland, NYC, December 17, 2014

Reviewed by Peter Haas for Cabaret Scenes

Michael-Feinstein-Happy-Holidays-Cabaret-Scenes-Magazine_212Celebrating the release of the first holiday album [selections from a collection previously available only through a TV offer] of his career, Michael Feinstein has brought a 17-piece brass band to accompany him as he sings at Birdland for the two-week pre-Christmas/New Year period. Delivering a festival of a dozen great popular songs, plus a medley of other all-time favorites, Feinstein is up, with energy, style, humor and charm—and is singing better than ever. The evening offers a non-stop program of standards, delivered in bright non-standard arrangements. Heading the band with his own energy and piano skills is Tedd Firth.

Several of the numbers are given new treatments: “Broadway Baby“ (Sondheim), usually brassy, but sung by Michael in in a slow-and-easy tempo; “I Won’t Dance” (Kern/Fields/Harbach/Hammerstein), in a quiet, romantic style; and “Is You Is or Is You Ain’t (My Baby)” (Jordan/Austin), delivered big and brassy. A change of pace is “Time in a Bottle” (Jim Croce) accompanied simply by Pete Smith on guitar. A tribute to Irving Berlin includes Feinstein’s solo “Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep)” and the band’s joining him on “It Only Happens When I Dance with You.”

The finale could be a program in itself: a medley of a dozen songs that were in Frank Sinatra’s repertoire, from “Come Fly with Me,” “A Foggy Day (in London Town),” “I’ve Got the World on a String” and “All or Nothing At All” to a lively “Night and Day” and a soft “Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out to Dry.”

The show runs past Christmas, through Saturday night, December 27. With candles on the tables gently lighting up the room, Feinstein’s return to Birdland is itself a Christmas present.

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Incidentally, look for a new Feinstein’s room in the coming year: Michael announced that his new space, Feinstein’s on Broadway, will be opening in the coming year, within the Birdland building.

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Peter Haas

Writer, editor, lyricist and banjo plunker, Peter Haas has been contributing features and performance reviews for Cabaret Scenes since the magazine’s infancy. As a young folk-singer, he co-starred on Channel 13’s first children’s series, Once Upon a Day; wrote scripts, lyrics and performed on Pickwick Records’ children’s albums, and co-starred on the folk album, All Day Singing. In a corporate career, Peter managed editorial functions for CBS Records and McGraw-Hill, and today writes for a stable of business magazines. An ASCAP Award-winning lyricist, his work has been performed at Carnegie Hall, Feinstein’s, Metropolitan Room and other fine saloons.