Music & More

After Susan Werner and an intermission, it was time for Livingston Taylor. Taylor's set was either a delightful batch of songs performed in celebration of his now fifty year career, or his set may have been a master class in the popular song, giving the crowd a taste of what it might be like taking one of his courses at Berklee College of Music in Boston. In actuality, Taylor's set was a little of both. A little more than half of his selections were originals, and although he didn't draw many songs from his early days, Taylor's compositions showcased his finely tuned sense of melody with all the lyrical humor and poignancy that his fans have come to expect. After leading off with "Blame It On Me", Taylor got right to it, talking about Jerome Kern (1885-1945). "He was the grandmaster of the popular song. All he wanted to be was a pop writer, and boy was he ever. He had so much grace and so much dignity that all the young pops that came after him, ...

The Colonial Theater crowd was the beneficiary Saturday night April 1st as Point Entertainment booked a pair of headliners to perform, Livingston Taylor and Susan Werner. Susan Werner did the opening set, even though she's been headlining her own shows for many years. I've been to her shows a number of times, but as she played this time it occurred to me that I had somehow forgotten just how good she is. At the outset, Livingston Taylor came out and introduced her with tons of praise. Werner started strong with "Kicking the Beehive," the lead track from the album of the same name (2010). She followed with "The Last of the Good, Straight Girls", which led into "I Can't Be New" , all three seeming like signature songs, in a way. One of the things I like best about Werner is the way that she unapologetically writes her views into her material, no matter whether the topic is political, religious, or social. Her next two songs opened a few...

Anuhea played at the upstairs venue of World Cafe Live for the second time on Wednesday, March 22nd. It was four years less one day since her last show there on March 23, 2013. We arrived nice and early, which was good for a couple of reasons. We got a great location right up front, which you'll see in the videos. We had time for a leisurely dinner. The World Cafe menu is always interesting, and the food is always good. And finally, as we sat down, Anuhea began her soundcheck, which was a nice and lengthy version of "Higher Than the Clouds", the song that she chose to close her set. She left the stage to her guitarist Mahi, who played some dazzling lead guitar. The show began with an opening set by Philly local BoyWonder (Andre Coles), who sang accompanying himself on acoustic guitar. According to his bio, he grew up in West Philadelphia, "Andre was exposed to a myriad of music genres Blues, Jazz, Motown, Philly International, and Gospel yet the Police remained ...

Photos courtesy of Murray McLauchlan New Music Friday : Many singers, at some point in their career, find their way to the Great American Songbook. Some go to that well more than once, such as Rod Stewart and Bob Dylan. Of all the standards albums I've heard, I don't think that anyone has produced one more enjoyable than Love Can't Tell Time by Murray McLauchlan, released Friday, March 17th. And this isn't even a standards album, it only sounds like one. Murray McLauchlan is a Scottish born Canadian singer, songwriter, and musician with eighteen previous albums to his credit. I started listening to him back in the early 70s when men were men and records were made of vinyl. I enjoyed a number of visits to Montreal in those days, including a mid January honeymoon. There is a lot to like in Montreal: there's the food, the metro system, the diversity of international cultures, and the shopping, not the least of which is some fine record shopping. Among my many ...

Early last Saturday, I posted this: "I'm excited to see Svetlana & The Delancey Five tonight at Joe's Pub. If you're in the New York area, there are only a few tickets left and you must see this delightful singer and her amazing band. I don't see how music can get any better than this." Within about three minutes at Joe's Pub, I answered my own rhetorical question. The only thing better than the music on the debut LP by Svetlana & The Delancey Five might be hearing it live. No matter how good a recording may be, even a live one, there is no substitute for being right there in the moment to experience a great singer and band. There's nothing else quite like it. Svetlana & The Delancey Five were in fine form for her birthday show Saturday night, March 4th at Joe's Pub. This is one of the best venues in New York, in that it's small and intimate, with excellent lighting and sound. Svetlana voice was clear, true, and strong. The ban...

Photo courtesy of Stevie Nicks Stevie Nicks joined a growing group of artists, which include The Who, Phil Collins, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, and many others, who are seeing their catalogs revamped with double disc reissues of remastered albums containing rare material as a bonus. Nicks wrote and sang some of my favorite Fleetwood Mac songs including "Landslide" (Fleetwood Mac), "Silver Stream" (Rumours B-Side), "Beautiful Child" and "Sara" (Tusk). When Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks joined Fleetwood Mac in late 1974, listeners immediately found their one album called Buckingham Nicks that had come out in 1973. When the reformulated Fleetwood Mac released their self-titled (white album) in 1975, fans marveled at the way in which Fleetwood Mac seem to have adopted the Buckingham Nicks sound. That album and its follow-up, Rumours , were both huge hits selling millions of copies and making Fleetwood Mac a household name. Nicks remai...

Photo: Steve Atkins The Rolling Stones played a free concert in Havana, Cuba on March 25, 2016, capping off an historic week in which the thawing of relations between Cuba and the United States was celebrated with an official visit by President Barack Obama. The concert had it all: history for one thing, Cuba had never seen a rock concert on the scale of this magnitude. The concert had a huge audience; estimates varied but it's a safe bet that the Stones played to several hundred thousand people. The Rolling Stones are never short on drama, but this one had drama to the max. The one thing this concert had that may be surprising is that the Stones, despite their advanced ages, gave a superb performance, much more about that below. Photo: NME First, about the event: “Finally, the times are changing,” proclaimed Mick Jagger to a vast, euphoric crowd in Havana on Friday night, as the Rolling Stones completed their Latin American tour with a concert that may well prove a pivot...