"I Just Found Out About Love” “(and I like it, I like it)," by Harold Adamson and Jimmy McHugh, is Nicole Henry's opening tune at the Metropolitan Room. The audiences she is reeling in monthly are rethinking the lyrics just a bit to read—"I just found out about Nicole Henry (and I like her, I like her)."

With an infectious spirit, distinctive delivery and velvety vocal tone, Nicole Henry is redefining many of the most familiar songs from the Great American Songbook with shots of jazz and nuances of pop and soul.

She has no theme to the show, no informative patter, but at this performance, she chatted casually with the audience and the band, and did she work that toned bootie! Most important, however, she sang. Every song was refreshing with a dauntless sense of time and confidence. She sank into the lyrics with crystal clear diction and a distinct, clipped pronunciation, and she explored the meaning of the song with solid phrasing.

Henry's uptempo tunes like Cole Porter's "You Do Something to Me" with Alvester Garnett's incessant drums, exuded a shiver of joyful excitement that visibly rose up through her fingertips. Potent bluesy ballads like "Stormy Weather" (Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler) seemed to physically pull her down with overwhelming despair. Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen's "But Beautiful" was simply that and "Comes Love" (Charles Tobias, Lew Brown, Sammy H. Stept) took on added immediacy with Richie Goods' bass accompaniment. Her cookin' trio is completed by John di Martino on piano.

With glamour, talent and joyful personality to spare, Nicole Henry is a class act on any stage. See her once and you'll see her again. She is appearing monthly at the Metropolitan Room.

Elizabeth Ahlfors
Cabaret Scenes
January 15, 2010
www.cabaretscenes.org