Curtis Stigers
SFJAZZ Joe Henderson Lab, San Francisco, CA, February 17, 2023
Reviewed by Steve Murray
Photo: Ben Wolf
Right off the bat, I must admit I’m prejudiced. Curtis Stigers is my favorite male vocalist, and each time I see him it only reinforces my good taste. In two all-too-brief one-hour shows at SF JAZZ, singer-saxophonist Stigers, a genre chameleon, worked his magic in a retrospective of his decades-long career. His new CD titled This Life reimagines his hits and his favorite covers, and it provided the content for these shows.
Remarking that he was a few days late, Stigers covered two love songs, Steve Earle’s folky “Valentine’s Day” and Rodgers and Hart’s classic “My Funny Valentine.” Both songs got the Stigers treatment as he mixed his super-controlled tenor voice with his excellent tenor sax solos; he was accompanied by the amazing piano runs by Matthew Fries. Nick Lowe’s “(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding” had a funky R&B feel. (Stigers’ cover was included on the 45 million-selling soundtrack to the movie The Bodyguard.)
“This Life,” the theme for the cult TV show Sons of Anarchy that Stigers wrote with Dave Kushner, Bob Thiele, Jr., and Kurt Sutter, was preceded by the old spiritual “John the Revelator”—both gritty statements that showcased Stigers’ range and acoustic guitar skills. As a huge fan of Randy Newman, he covered Newman’s heartbreaking “Real Emotional Girl” and his uplifting “I’ll Be Home.” Harry Edison and Jon Hendricks’ 1958 jazz standard “Centerpiece” swung with Stigers’ considerable jazz chops and was the first highlight of the show.
The music business never quite knew what to do with Stigers, who refused to be pigeon-holed into any one genre. He’s a great jazz vocalist who combines the stylings of Mel Tormé and Mark Murphy with the high-stretching range of Tony Bennett, the contemporary storytelling of Newman and Billy Joel, and the gritty bluesman-like quality such as Dr. John. Stigers covered it all with his unique voice and his fine musicality. He can easily shift genres from the beautifully nuanced ballad “I Wonder Why,” to Emmy Lou Harris’ “I Don’t Want to Talk About It,” and then to a stunningly sparse arrangement of Oscar Hammerstein II and Jerome Kern’s “All the Things You Are.”
By the second-show closer, a sizzling “Everyday I Have the Blues,” I was gratefully reminded of Stigers’ immense talent. He may be feeling a tad nostalgic in presenting this retrospective, but these shows highlighted just how contemporary and significant he is.
