[Dixielandjazz] The Ultimate "Crossover"?

[Steve barbone]

Barbara Cook is an OKOM singer. Lots of American Songbook. What was she
doing singing at the Metropolitan Opera House in NYC? The first Pop/Caberet
singer ever to perform there.

Perhaps proving to those who still resist the idea of expanding musical
offerings at Festivals, that other single genre venues are doing just that
in order to expand the audience, or in order to survive.

Get used to it folks.

Cheers,
Steve

Music Review | Barbara Cook

For a Cabaret Star, a Solo Turn at the Met Opera
NY TIMES - By ANTHONY TOMMASINI - January 21, 2006

Barbara Cook is not just a casual opera buff, but an informed devotee. She
can frequently be spotted in the audience at the Metropolitan Opera, not
only for crowd-pleasers like "Madama Butterfly" but also for heavy-duty fare
like "Parsifal." 

But last night, to her utter delight, Ms. Cook was on the stage, presented
by the Met as part of its official season, the first female singer from the
pop and cabaret worlds ever to be honored with a solo concert there. If the
Met is consecrated to great vocal artistry, then Barbara Cook belongs there.
That was clearly the feeling of the fans who greeted her with a prolonged
standing ovation.

To give the 3,700-seat house a sense of intimacy, Ms. Cook and her excellent
five-man combo, led by the pianist and music director Eric Stern, played
atop a platform that covered the orchestra pit. But what really lent the
performance its remarkable intimacy was Ms. Cook's intensely communicative
and poignant singing. She opened with a sweetly sassy rendition of the Cy
Coleman-Dorothy Fields song "If They Could See Me Now," standing before a
projected photograph of her grammar school class when she was 6 and, as she
pointed out, already seducing the camera.

In a program that lasted nearly two hours without intermission, she sang
old-time favorites by Gershwin, a couple of songs by new talents she
believes in - John Bucchino and Amanda McBroom - and several songs by her
beloved Stephen Sondheim.

It's hard to account for why Ms. Cook, at 78, is singing, if anything,
better than ever, with more elegance and vulnerability. There has been some
diminishment of her voice, naturally. High notes don't come so easily
anymore. Yet the way she reaches to her high range and spins a phrase with
melting pianissimos is an object lesson for opera singers. The basic
lightness and rosy bloom of her voice remain miraculously fresh. But through
that youthful-sounding voice, she conveys a lifetime of feeling - joy, pain
and hard-won wisdom.

Three guests joined her, including the amazing Audra McDonald and the
fresh-voiced Josh Grobin. But the house roared when the indomitable Elaine
Stritch showed up to sing a gritty-voiced rendition of her signature tune,
Mr. Sondheim's "Ladies Who Lunch."

For decades Ms. Cook has been a fine practitioner of the art of singing with
amplification. But for her encore she put down the microphone and sang a
gorgeously tender account of "We'll Be Together Again," in what seemed a
gesture to the Met as a house for the natural voice.

She had some memory lapses in a few songs and was abjectly apologetic. But
the program was being recorded, which was a tremendous pressure. And just
being at the Met, though exhilarating, was also overwhelming, she said. She
spoke of the Met as a place where she has enjoyed many great nights. I hope
she understands that for Met fans in her audience, this was another