Lillias White

A Lillias White Christmas
The Green Room 42, NYC, December 14, 2019
Reviewed by Alix Cohen

Wide-eyed, animated, and bright, the festooned Lillias White opens this evening with “I Keep Christmas in My Pocket.” A bag of candy is circulated among the audience. Referring back to a Brooklyn childhood, she follows with “Gee Whiz, It’s Christmas,” a song she listened to Carla Thomas perform back when. The vocal goes up an octave. The somewhat silly 1960s song arrives straight from the hip and rather sweet: “My best friend’s having a party/ And everybody’s going/I know it’s gonna be a lot of fun, oh by the way/It’s snowing.”

“Through the Eyes of a Child” is unmelodic, classical in feeling. Her hands rise and fall, welcome and withdraw. Also eclectic, “My Christmas Song for You” is vintage sentiment. James Sampliner’s fulsome piano allows us not to miss the presence of a band.

Introduced as a tribute to Betty Boop, the iconic “Button Up Your Overcoat,” with neat music-hall piano, quickly veers into something more contemporary: “When you meet a traffic cop, use diplomacy-or he’ll shoot ya.” Really?! (I have no qualms with later, verbal allusions to the awful state of our country.) “Santa Baby,” as she circulates through the audience trying a Santa hat on various men, is more successfully flirty, even though it’s  hampered by one hand holding the microphone. Her vocal coloring is wonderfully diverse.

“I always wanted to celebrate the holidays on a beach in the Caribbean. My father was from The West Indies.
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” With pitch-perfect island accent, the performer sings a rhythmic, undulating “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” enlisting the audience in multi-part back-up. And she dances. Fun!

“We in the room are lucky. There are people who don’t have much during the holidays” introduces a theatrical “Blue Holiday.” Leaning in, one hand fisted, White delivers controlled, slip/slide blues. A beautifully arranged, jazz-flavored “Silent Night” showcases molasses chops, while “I’m Getting’ Along Alright” erupts.

Lillias White has a force-of-life instrument. When she opens full blast, jazz, gospel, and r-&-b surge from gut and heart. She can commandeer a stage and seduce an audience. Her confidence in this seems to have made the vocalist less committed to sufficient rehearsal. It’s disconcerting to see the Tony winner careless with her presentation.