SoCal-based vocalist Judy Wexler displays excellent taste in not only song selection, but in the delivery of material beyond the standards or songbooks from the Baby Boomer era. She adroitly teams up with a core team of Angelenos Alan Pasqua/p, Larry Koonse/g, Darek Oles/b and Steve Hass/dr as well as guests John Johnson/as, Bob Sheppard/fl, Stefanie Fife/cel and Aaron Serfaty/perc for a rich and mature collection of songs.
Wexler’s voice is as clear as a windswept night to the hip backbeat of Luciana Souza’s “Circus Life” that gives her rich tone a chance to emote the lyrics, while she wonderfully exudes desperation to Sinne Eeg’s “Crowded Heart.” Alan Pasqua’s own “And We Will Fly” is an intimate affair with the pianist, while the team with Johnson creates a dark modal path on the long shadow’d “I Took Your Hand.” Wexler gives a wonderful pulse to the delectable samba intro with Pasqua on Fred Hersch’s “Stars” and is clearly bohemian with melodica on the artsy and Left Bank’d “Parisian Heartbreak.” Rich oil paintings with a fine brush.