Will's New York Nite Life

As has been observed before, the ironic thing about Steve Tyrell is that even though he’s easily one of the most successful living masters of the art of making records - both as a producer and a vocalist - he is even better when experienced live, especially in the warm, intimate setting of the Carlyle. This is more true than ever during the holiday season, when the sweet sensations of nostalgia for home and family and the good times of years gone by become even more palpable, as lovingly rendered by Mr. Tyrell with his mellow, delightfully raspy baritone.

The San Francisco-based singer, who, alas, hasn’t played Jazz at Lincoln Center since 2013, herewith makes a triumphant return in New York. Miss West, who headlined at the Oak Room of the Algonquin for much of the previous decade, was at the time celebrated for bringing a touch of jazz to what was then New York’s most venerated cabaret room; now, she’s doing the opposite, bringing the lyric-driven spirit and humor of the best cabaret artists to the most visible jazz club in the country. Ms. West’s strengths are still the same, only stronger, not least of which is the ability to switch gears between such traditional jazz-and-cabaret fare as Rodgers and Hart (“Lover”) and more contemporary songsters, like John Lennon (“Gimme Some Truth”), while stopping at such iconclasts as Oscar Brown Jr. (“The Snake,” “Hum-Drum Blues”) along the way. A formidable swinger as well as a storyteller, she still delivers the most compelling interpretation of “Like a Rolling Stone” that I’ve ever heard, as well as of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “The Waters of March” - which, in her hands, is so soulful and personal that it could be titled “The Ethel Waters of March.”