There is a particularly warm glow to Steve Tyrell swinging with his band at the Café Carlyle, and it is not only because of the holiday season. Tyrell has found love and reveals that he andhs fiancé will be married after New Year’s Day at the hotel.  Yes, admit it, romance always adds a certain something to a cabaret show, especially with the affable Tyrell singing so many favorite standards.

Houston-born with strong blues influences, Tyrell lets the good times roll in this sixth year at the Café Carlyle.  Singing Fats Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’,” his gravely voice and amiable grin lend a quality of some favorite neighbor who happens to sing, knows lots of songs and brings life to any party.  The new lady in his life obviously inspires an incandescence to his abundance of love songs.  Two favorites, he says, are “Come Rain or Come Shine” and “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered,” rendered with more compelling intimacy than is usually present in his programs.  Tyrell basically stands in front of his first-class band, singing and swinging and magnetizing the audience, but not reinventing the song.  A long-time record producer and more recently a singer, he obviously loves this music and enjoys singing the tunes and hearing the musicians behind him.  They include pianist Quinn Johnson, guitarist Bob Mann, David Mann on flute and sax, David Finck on bass, Kevin Winard on drums and Jon Allen on keyboards.

Many of the songs in I’ll Take Romance are already comfortably tucked in the Tyrell songbook, but none more so than “The Way You Look Tonight,” which he sang in the film Father of the Bride, whicht launched Tyrell’s balladeer career.  With a salute to Burt Bacharach, he sings “This Guy’s in Love with You” (lyrics: Hal David) and he add his own take on a Little Willie John R&B hit song of the 1950s, “Talk to Me, Talk to Me.”

Steve Tyrell’s yearly opening at the posh Manhattan boîte always heralds the start of the holiday season and this year, bringing romance along, he ups the pleasure by sharing a memorable moment with an appreciative audience.

Elizabeth Ahlfors
Cabaret Scenes
November 9, 2010
www.cabaretscenes.org