Hearing Karen Lane is a real treat. She has a lovely pussycat voice, with a hint of Billie Holiday.  Mix that with a sexy vibrato and tremolo and you get a unique and listenable voice.

Karen sang songs mostly from her fourth CD, Beautiful Love. I love her song choices and her interpretations. Each has a sultry, warm feel to it and, for the most part, Karen’s understanding of the lyrics is terrific.

The highlight was a cha-cha-cha arrangement of “Lullaby of Birdland,” featuring great sax and piano solos, and some nice scat from Karen. I also loved “Softly, As in a Morning Sunrise,” which began with music full of intrigue and included a mean bass solo. Her slow swing version of “I Thought About You” was beautiful, and Robin Fincker on sax soared with his best sax solo of the evening. Tom Cawley (piano), Andy Hammill (bass) and Nic France (drums) each had his moment to shine, too.

Some criticisms: Karen sings with her eyes closed for far too long in each song. I notice this quite often with jazz singers and it’s just not audience-friendly. Also, each song had a similar framework to it. Karen would sing, followed by a sax solo, then more instrumental solos, and Karen would sing again. A bit more variety would have been welcome.

Karen Lane is well worth seeing.

This is the second jazz concert at Lauderdale House where the sax player was truly remarkable. Lauderdale House? Good sax!

Harold Sanditen
Cabaret Scenes
June 17, 2010
www.cabaretscenes.org