We recalled Jim Speake’s Cy Coleman show a year earlier, after which we wrote “there’s a showman inside Jim Speake that revealed itself too few times,” making us eager to catch his new one, My Generation, to see what changes time had wrought.

One change was that Speake had shifted his attentions from the more traditional cabaret fare of Coleman’s musical theater songs to a collection of songs from the 'sixties and 'seventies.  He did note another change. The earlier mantra of “don’t trust anyone over thirty” seemed out of date now that his “orthopedic shoe is on the other foot.”

My Generation included works by songwriters Jimmy Webb, Lennon and McCartney, Carole King, Stevie Wonder, Carly Simon, Jim Croce and others, a nostaligia trip for baby boomers as retirement age approaches for many of them.

Speake has flashes of vivacity on Don’t Tell Mama’s cozy backroom stage. A lusty opener with Jimmy Webb’s "Up, Up and Away,” and a jubilant rendition of Jim Croce’s “You Don’t Mess Around with Jim”— replete with added material of his own.

With Speake were Steven Ray Watkins on piano, electric bass player Don Fabricatore, drummer Jerry Smith, and two backup singers, Wendy A. Russell and Lennie Watts, who also directed the program.  They hit their peak as an ensemble when the singers came downstage, and with everyone jamming away, did a rollicking Chicago medley.

Speake and the group worked hard with their selections.  Perhaps a little too hard in the small space.  Two things would help in that room.  Bring down the volume of the band a shade or two, and let Speake, obviously determined to deliver his songs with gusto, relax and enjoy the ride.  His more easy-going rendition of Neil Sedaka’s “Solitaire” was right on the mark.

Speake and My Generation are at Don’t Tell Mama again on Saturday, October 17.

Peter Leavy
Cabaret Scenes
October 13, 2009
www.cabaretscenes.org