Attention fans of vocal jazz! This review is for YOU! What Jackie Paris is to male singers, Beverly Kinney is to females. She had an incredibly individual voice all her own, recorded some incredibly moving music, never quite got to the top tier, and, suddenly, just like that (in her case because of suicide) had a career that was abruptly cut off from the music scene. Don’t let this tragic life go away without meaning. This pair of 2 cd sets covers everything you’ll want, and make you scrounge around for anything else that might be out there.
The Royal Roost sessions find her at her most hip and swinging. There’s a ’55 session that has her fronting a very in the pocket quartet that features Johnny Smith on guitar, a ’56 session with Ralph Burns’ Orchestra (with Milt Hinton on bass), a ’57 outing with pianist Jimmy Jones leading members of the Atomic Basie band (like Frank Wess, Freddie Green, Eddie Jones and Jo Jones-interested yet?!?) and a collection of radio shows and things left on the recording studio floor. Her voice has the clarity of Ella, the swing of Holiday and the playfulness of Dearie, yet it’s all her own. She takes a piece like “Destination Moon” and twirls it like a Foster Freeze, while on “You Go To My Head” she sounds positively ruminative. The session with Basie’s band finds her in her most comfortable element, floating over “Old Buttermilk Sky” or “Isn’t This a Lovely Day?” with a confidence that few inherently have. She had it!
The Decca recordings follows the same format, with the music sounding just a tad more formal. Kenny is accompanied by Ellis Larkins/p and Joe Benjamin for a 1957 intimate collection of under the radar material like “A Summer Romance” and “A Lover Like You,” as well as more familiar material such as “What is There to Say” and the mood is haunting all throughout. Hal Mooney’s band and a small combo that includes Ed Shaghnessy/dr, Charlie Shavers/tp, Al Klink/ts and Chuck Wayne. A few bonus sessions, as well as a pair of vintage TV appearances round out this intriguing collection . She bares her soul with Larkins on “Tr a Little Tenderness” and “A Summer Romance,” while takes Mel Torme’s “Borne to be Blue” and makes it her own. She is quite playful on “Tampico” and “Undecided” and “Long, Lean and Lanky” is an absolute hoot. The fact that she was unappreciated during her terribly short life is a crime, and an added footnote to the line in Ecclesiastes that under the sun, all is vanity. Try to get some meaning out of it all by enjoying what she brought to us still on this side of eternity.
Fresh Sound Records
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