Tierney Sutton
Birdland, NYC, May 24, 2022
Reviewed by Ron Forman
Tierney Sutton is a pure jazz vocalist. She has a sound and style that are entirely her own and works wonderfully well with the songs that she performs. Her hand movements and interesting facial expressions added much to each number. She has a style of scatting that often had me tapping table with the pen I was using to take notes. The arrangements were totally unique, especially for the songs she chose from the Great American Songbook. Her interpretations of these classic songs had me listening to them as if I were hearing them for the first time. In addition, her off-the-cuff remarks were generally quite amusing. Her quartet—Christian Jacob (piano), Trey Henry (bass), and Ray Brinker (drums))—was as good as any jazz band, I have heard. They all took frequent dazzling solos.
Sutton had the perfectly appropriate voice for her opening number—a haunting “Windmills of Your Mind.” She started very slowly then sped up when she began scatting before fading out at the close. She followed with Bob Dorough’s “Devil May Care,” giving each musician an applause-inducing solo. After speaking about the trials and tribulations of the two-year lockdown, she gave a very touching performance of Jason Robert Brown’s “Hope,” accompanied only by Jacob. She did a super-fast “’S Wonderful” that was enhanced greatly by Brinker on drums. Irving Berlin might have been turning over in his grave, but I loved her very exciting medley of three of his songs—an unusual and very exciting “Let’s Face the Music and Dance,” a super-fast “Cheek to Cheek,” and “Blue Skies” as it’s never been done before, featuring a dazzling solo by Jacob. “On Broadway” was another exciting number performed by the whole quartet. She closed with a West Side Story medleythat began with a very fast “Something’s Coming” and was followed by an even faster “Cool” before circling back to “Something’s Coming.” She said she wanted to end the show with a happy song, and she did so with her encore, the Vincent Youmans/Billy Rose/Edward Eliscu “Great Day,” featuring an amazing, very fast solo by Jacob.
