Veronica Swift - This Bitter Earth

Styles: Vocal
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 61:14
Size: 141,1 MB
Art: Front

(4:27) 1. This Bitter Earth
(4:11) 2. How Lovely to Be a Woman
(5:16) 3. You've Got to Be Carefully Taught
(6:19) 4. Getting to Know You
(4:50) 5. The Man I Love
(4:25) 6. You're the Dangerous Type
(5:20) 7. Trust in Me
(2:11) 8. He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)
(4:56) 9. As Long as He Needs Me
(2:54) 10. Everybody Has the Right to Be Wrong
(4:16) 11. Prisoner of Love
(6:21) 12. The Sports Page
(5:44) 13. Sing

With This Bitter Earth, 26-year-old Veronica Swift casts aside her designated trajectory as the next great up-and-coming pure-jazz singer to embrace something grander, more pop-oriented and profound. The daughter of late pianist Hod O’Brien, Swift belted her first album out of the club as a precocious nine-year-old. Four albums later, Confessions cemented her rep as a jazz lioness with a pure tone, large lungs, a knowing sense of repertoire, and sure swing style. JazzTimes readers rewarded her with 2019 Best New Artist and Best Vocal Release poll wins.

Perhaps more naturally than everyone’s current favorite, Cécile McLorin Salvant, Swift occupies classic standards like a young Anita O’Day. But This Bitter Earth finds her pushing beyond cloistered jazz boundaries, recalling the sunny, big-throated readings of Eydie Gormé allied to the sincerity and tone of Broadway vocalist Jessie Mueller. She still thrills with Songbook nuggets (“As Long as He Needs Me,” “The Man I Love”), but restless as any 20-something vocalist aware of Lady Gaga and Billie Eilish, Swift shows her further ambitions in non-ironic takes of Goffin and King’s “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)” and the Ann-Margret vehicle “How Lovely to Be a Woman.” She boldly addresses the songs as they were intended—which is arguably a gutsier stance on pre-feminist material than that of Salvant, who revels in overturning a song’s intended meaning.

Elsewhere, “Everybody Has the Right to Be Wrong” rescues the cha-cha from semi-obscurity, while “Prisoner of Love” is languorous and rich, Swift wrapping herself around the melody like a Broadway diva. The gently unfurling “Sing” closes the record and returns Swift to what she does best, enchanting the listener with whispered caresses and elastic phrases that are as powerful as they are enticing.~ By Ken Micallef https://jazztimes.com/reviews/albums/veronica-swift-this-bitter-earth-mack-avenue/

This Bitter Earth

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Veronica Swift - Confessions

Styles: Vocal
Year: 2019
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 51:33
Size: 119,6 MB
Art: Front

(3:47) 1. You're Gonna Hear from Me
(3:41) 2. A Little Taste
(5:12) 3. Interlude
(5:01) 4. Forget About the Boy
(6:22) 5. A Stranger in Town
(3:08) 6. I Don't Wanna Cry Anymore
(4:23) 7. I Hope She Makes You Happy
(6:43) 8. Confession / The Other Woman
(3:44) 9. Gypsy in My Soul
(3:34) 10. No Not Much
(2:24) 11. I'm Hip
(3:28) 12. No Regrets

Times change. In the Me Too era it is clearly politically incorrect for a female singer to sidle up to the microphone and huskily breathe "My Heart Belongs To Daddy" like Julie London used to do. Or even, for that matter, to lustily proclaim "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" like Marilyn Monroe. But a residue of that sort of thing (it's called sex appeal) needs to remain, regardless. Veronica Swift is the epitome of a modern female jazz singer. She can wear figure-hugging evening gowns and high heels, but she'll look her audience in their collective eye and state defiantly, "You're Gonna Hear from Me."

That's the one that goes, "Move over, sun and give me some sky; I've got these wings I'm eager to try." She comes back down to earth with a fine interpretation of Billie Holiday's "I Don't Want to Cry Anymore": "Oh, why can't I forget you; I know so well what is in store. A moment or two up in the clouds with you, Then back where I was before." "Forget About the Boy" and her own bittersweet "I Hope She Makes You Happy" leaven the mix: love seen from different angles. Talking of which, there's "Confession/The Other Woman," an angle on love that is rarely celebrated in song. Veronica Swift chooses her songs with great care. She grew up touring with her parents, jazz pianist Hod O'Brien and singer Stephanie Nakasian. So she knows the score.

She made her first appearance at Jazz at Lincoln Center when just 11 years old. In 2015 she won second place in the Thelonious Monk Jazz Competition and a year later headlined at the Telluride Jazz Festival. A residency at Birdland in New York followed, and in 2018 she began touring with trios fronted by pianists Emmet Cohen and Benny Green, both featured on this album. Her songs are marvelously well-crafted performances rooted in tradition, but up-to-the-minute in execution. When Johnny Hodges wrote "A Little Taste" in 1947, he surely never expected that a vocal version would ever be sung by a woman. In his day, when you wrote songs about them, you put women on pedestals.~ Chris Mosey https://www.allaboutjazz.com/confessions-veronica-swift-mack-avenue-records-review-by-chris-mosey.php

Personnel: Veronica Swift: vocals; Emmet Cohen Trio: Emmet Cohen, piano; Russell Hall, bass; Kyle Poole, drums (1, 2, 4-6, 9-12); Benny Green Trio: Benny Green: piano; David Wong: bass; Carl Allen: drums (3, 7-8).

Confessions

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