T. Oliver Reid is a Broadway veteran, a handsome fellow with a flexible, dark tenor which he uses to charming effect.  Reid is the winner of the Metropolitan Room's MetroStar competition and This Love I Know, a program loaded with standards of the Great American Songbook, is the direct result.

The problem with singing this repertoire is that it forces comparison with singers of yore who put their inimitable stamp on them.  It's like an actor doing Hamlet—we know the words—it's the interpretation, the new, personal spin that the audience relishes. Unfortunately, this is where T. Oliver Reid fell a bit short.

He framed his program as if he were writing a book on dating, romance and the inevitable collapse of relationships, citing "chapters" which were illustrated by the songs.  He began with a cheery section which included "Hooray for Love" segueing into the more thoughtful "All the Things You Are" and continuing on to the flowering of a relationship ("Let's Fall in Love") and its fading ("You Don't Bring Me Flowers”).  Ever hopeful, he began again with a conversational "This Can't Be Love" and a bemused "I Wish I Were In Love Again."   Intimacy was touched on with "Like a Lover" (Dori Caymmi, Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman, Nelson Motta) and a couldn't-care-less attitude in Coward's "Any Little Fish."  The program ended with an adroit combining of two songs with the title "I Got Love," the first from Purlie! (Geld/Udell) and the other by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields.

This final number and a lovely, moving rendition of "Over the Rainbow" were the closest he came to owning the songs.  His technique is strong and clearly he is totally invested in his work.  He's not glib or into style over substance.  But he comes across as a sweet, good-looking guy who loves to sing, and not—yet—a deep interpreter of well-known songs.

His Musical Director Larry Yurman on the piano provided color and texture, while Damien Bassman on percussion and Conrad Korsch, a last minute substitute, gave great rhythmic support.

Joel Benjamin
Cabaret Scenes
February 12, 2011
www.cabaretscenes.org