[Dixielandjazz] Paula West & The George Mesterhazy Quartet

[Steve Barbone]

If in NYC, you won't be disappointed should you see this group perform. They
are at the Algonquin's Oak Room until Nov 11. Fall by with someone you love.

George Mesterhazy can usually be found at the Merion Hotel in Cape May New
Jersey where he has a long running, steady gig. He is a legend in the
Atlantic City/Cape May jazz music circles. He Interrupts his steady every
once in a while with appearances on his own, or with singers such as the
late great Shirley Horn, and now, Ms. West

Paula West is, like Shirley Horn was, an original. Though not yet in "Jazz
Master" Horn's class, she is outstanding.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone


Jazz Without Borders, and Coated in Blues
Paula West The singer opened with the George Mesterhazy quartet on Tuesday.

NY TIMES - STEPHEN HOLDEN - October 26, 2006

³How does it feel?² The tone in which those four words are delivered is a
critical factor in determining the psychic damage wrought by Bob Dylan¹s
musical missile, ³Like a Rolling Stone.² When the jazz singer Paula West
sang them at the Oak Room of the Algonquin Hotel on Tuesday evening, she
underplayed the composer¹s crowing sarcasm and the song emerged in a softer
light.

Yes, ³Like a Rolling Stone² will always be a hipster¹s savagely gleeful
portrait of a privileged princess¹s downfall. But as Ms. West asked how it
felt in a quiet, urgent voice, empathy overcame contempt; there but for the
grace of God. 

Ms. West¹s affinity for Bob Dylan, whose songs she regularly puts into her
shows, recalls the passion for his music expressed by Nina Simone, another
black female singer who went even farther in personalizing his lyrics. Like
Ms. Simone and like Cassandra Wilson, who also goes any musical place that
suits her, Ms. West refuses to be bound by categories.

Her new show, which plays through Nov. 11, casts the widest net, so far.
³Like a Rolling Stone² is sandwiched between ³Bewitched, Bothered and
Bewildered² and ³It Ain¹t Necessarily So² in a set that includes ³Softly, as
in a Morning Sunrise,² from ³The New Moon,² arranged as a sultry bolero, and
a pop-jazz ³Loch Lomond² sung back to back with ³Danny Boy.² Behind her, the
George Mesterhazy quartet stretches with her from Scotland to Nashville.

To everything she sings, Ms. West brings an ever-deepening feel for the
blues. Her voice, though reminiscent of both Ms. Simone¹s and Ms. Wilson¹s,
has a thicker caramel coating. This sound was the focus of an attenuated
version of that archetypal torch song, ³Why Was I Born?,² in which she
lingered over the words at the ends of phrases as though the answers to the
song¹s metaphysical questions lay buried in the texture of her own voice.

For all her stylistic wanderings, Ms. West always returns to home base, a
place where blues and jazz songs are inflected with a sly, humorous
appreciation of the absurd and the naughty. She turned Leonard Feather¹s
breezy ³Man Wanted,² a desperate woman¹s humorous personal ad for a man
³young or old, fat or lean, hot or cold, kind or mean² into a
tongue-in-cheek frolic.

Finally came her signature song, ³The Snake,² Oscar Brown Jr.¹s urban folk
tale about a woman¹s fatal attraction to a poisonous reptile who hustles
her; this bit of caramel dosed with arsenic made a tasty encore.

Paula West performs through Nov. 11 at the Oak Room of the Algonquin, 59
West 44th Street; (212) 419-9331.