February 14-18, 2024 | Birdland Jazz Club, New York City
After her spectacularly successful, sold-out Valentine’s week residency at Birdland last year, celebrating her acclaimed album Out of The Dark: The Film Noir Project, Melissa returns with an entirely new program, this time celebrating her forthcoming album of New York songs by the greatest of New York songwriters, Sondheim In The City. From wistful ballads of young love (“What More Do I Need”) to hard-edged anthems of middle-aged angst (“The Little Things We Do Together”), Melissa will sing the many faces of her native city through the words and music of the man who saw it best. But it won’t be all Sondheim: this Manhattan valentine will also be embroidered with classics by Cole Porter, Rodgers & Hart, and even Billy Joel. Come to New York’s most legendary jazz club and hear why The Wall Street Journal calls Melissa Errico, “A nonpareil performer” and why Broadway World announced that she is “one of the great musical interpreters of our time.”
The wonderful thing about Melissa Errico is that her intellect and refinement are so much a part of who she is that she doesn’t have to dress it up – all she has to do is bring it into the room. Also, all she has to do is adorn those qualities with the right colleagues. Tedd Firth. Michel Legrand. Adam Gopnik. Stephen Sondheim. In Sondheim In The City, featuring Mr. Firth’s fine jazz treatments for songs from not-quite-exclusively Manhattan-based musicals, Melissa Errico has captured the feel of the Metropolitan lifestyle that Stephen Sondheim very clearly adored, and wanted to bring to life in his stories. The listener of the music of Melissa’s burg will feel the concrete beneath their feet, envision the lights of the horizon line, and live (for 57 sublime minutes) inside of the most magical reveries of the city… Producer Rob Mathes and Concord Theatricals have a triumph on their hands with Sondheim In The City, an album that should make Sondheim lovers out of Errico fans, and Errico devotees out of Sondheim aficionados. It is definitely an album to put on your “must have” list. On this 57-minute recording, Errico et al do themselves proud, they do Mr. Sondheim honor, and they do The City just right. But let’s be honest, here: Melissa Errico always does it just right.
—Erin Samms, Broadway World
Errico’s warmth and maturity are pervasive. Her lyric interpretation of the lyrics comes from experience. Songs that have quite often arrived upset are here tempered with perspective. Expectations are fewer, appreciation greater. Errico doesn’t sound insensitive; she sounds fortified. There’s even a touch of sophisticated ennui. “Dawn” (from the unproduced film, Singing Out Loud) arrives on effortless long notes with vibrato tails. Bruce Harris’ evocative, muted trumpet adds a patina of noir. A medley of “Opening Doors” (Merrily We Roll Along) and “What More Do I Need?” (Saturday Night) resonates with recollection. It opens with Firth’s tender piano, then swings as if to say “that was then, this is now.” Her stop/start phrasing almost giggles. “Take Me to the World” (Evening Primrose) wafts in on Matt Munisteri’s deft guitar and Lewis Nash’s supple percussion. Firth’s piano adds dappled shadows. “Can That Boy Foxtrot!” (cut from Follies) is here, for possibly the first time, a foxtrot! Instead of unbridled heat, we hear the admiration expressed by a woman who’s been around the block. Imagine Vera Simpson in Pal Joey singing it about Joey. (Errico could play that role.) “Anyone Can Whistle” (Anyone Can Whistle) is as unfussy and limpid as its aspiration. “Good Thing Going” (Merrily We Roll Along) is a slow stroll. Her phrasing makes it seem as though she’s conjuring up specific moments. She’s melancholy, earnest, resigned. “Uptown, Downtown” (cut from Follies) is sophisticated, almost churlish. The brass punctuates. Errico could be performing as one of Truman Capote’s Swans. “It Wasn’t Meant to Happen” (cut from Follies) features the same urbanity. Octave changes feel like pricking thorns. The song is rueful. “Being Alive” (Company) does not, as is common, painfully swell to the rafters. It’s a recognition of a life with perhaps a touch of advice. Melissa Errico knows who she is now, and it shows.
—Alix Cohen, Cabaret Scenes