Better known for her work with pianist Benny Green as a trad/swinger, vocalist Veronica Swift shows a wide breadth and width of sounds on this album of rich environs. She has a core team of Emmet Cohen/p, Yasushi Nakamura/b and Bryan Carter, but also expands horizons with a string quartet on some tracks as well as bringing in Aaron Johnson/woodwinds, Armand Hirsch/g and a group of background singers, as on the heartfelt commentary “Sing”. The strings work well here and also on the melancholy Broadwayish title pieces, bluesy and modal read of “You’ve Got to be Carefully Taught” and the cozy “Getting To Know You” that has her skating along the gentle foundation.
With Johnson on alto sax, Swift does a rapid bopper of a take as she sings and scats on “You’re the Dangerous Type” while getting Judy Collins folksy with Hirsch on acoustic guitar during the intimate “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)”. With the core unit, Cohen gives a Tchaikovsky touch to a fun and bluesy “How Lovely to Be A Woman” with Swift changing moods and dynamics with aplomb” while she is elastic with Nakamura on a flexible “The Man I Love”. Multi-hued melodies. Can’t wait to see what she does in person!