September in the Rain: The Songs of Harry Warren was the title of yesterday's jazz offering by The Mike Greensill Trio at Old First Church in the Old First Concerts series. Greensill apparently takes "truth in advertising" very seriously. Almost the first thing he did was establish that the program would not consist exclusively of Warren songs. Indeed, the only other "September song" was, as one might guess, "September Song," which Kurt Weill wrote to lyrics by Maxwell Anderson. Given the eccentricities this city has been enduring, one might also have worried that Greensill's title would have opened the month with another bout of bad weather (if not the official beginning of our rainy season); but yesterday fortunately turned out to be a blessedly dry one.
In the further interest of "truth in advertising," it is also important to note that Greensill's trio is not your standard jazz combo. Greensill is the pianist and occasional vocalist (he calls himself a crooner); but the only other instrumentalist is John Wiitala on bass. The third member of the trio is Greensill's wife, vocalist Wesla Whitfield. The two of them sang one duet, George and Ira Gershwin's "They Can't Take That Away From Me;" and Greensill took only one vocal solo in Warren's "You're My Education." All remaining vocals were Whitfield solos.
Harry Warren's songs are known far better than his name. He was born Salvatore Antonio Guaragna, one of eleven children of Italian immigrants, and grew up (where else?) in Brooklyn. I first became aware of him back in my days as a dance critic, when I started exploring Busby Berkeley's innovative synthesis of choreography and cinematography. Warren partnered with lyricist Al Dubin on such Berkeley classics as Gold Diggers of 1933, Gold Diggers of 1935, Footlight Parade, and, of course, Forty Second Street, which later translated nicely to the live Broadway stage, even without all of Berkeley's camera tricks. This side of Warren's work was represented yesterday by "I Only Have Eyes for You" from Dames. This was a source of one of the sillier duets sung by Ruby Keeler and Dick Powell, but Whitfield delivered it with the affectionate sincerity it deserved. Indeed, affection was very much the order of the afternoon, even in the more lighthearted numbers, such as "Jeepers Creepers" (one of Warren's collaborations with Johnny Mercer).
Another matter of "truth in advertising" involved the presence of one other performer, cellist Emil Miland. Miland is known best for his presentation of new compositions, many of which have been composed by Jake Heggie. On this occasion he joined Greensill and Wiitala for two Greensill originals, "A Minor Latin Tune" and "Waltz for Wesla." Greensill introduced the latter by saying that every jazz musician eventually writes a waltz for his sweetheart. "Waltz for Wesla" threatened to fall under the spell of Bill Evans' "Waltz for Debbie" but quickly moved off in a direction to establish its own turf. Miland then stuck around on stage to add his cello's voice to the remaining songs on the program, providing his own approach to "duet singing" with Whitfield.
The whole offering was clearly very much a trip down Memory Lane. However, it was not just a matter of remembering the elegant inventiveness of Warren and others from those days (such as Gershwin). It also took us back to a time when the words of the songs mattered as much as the music, and Whitfield's execution always drew us directly to the heart of the text, even when, as was the case with "The Girlfriend of a Whirling Dervish," that text (by Susannah McCorkle) was just the wordplay of light verse. September has definitely gotten off to a good start.
Comments