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BWW Reviews: Nostalgic Natalie Douglas Soars Again at Birdland With SCRAPBOOK 2.0
By: Stephen Hanks Jun. 28, 2013
Cabaret Reviews and Commentary by Stephen Hanks
Someone saved my life last Monday night.
Only two nights removed from the last of my three solo debut shows at the Metropolitan Room celebrating the Don McLean Songbook, I was already experiencing the post-performance depression I'd heard tell about from cabaret veterans. I needed someone to lift me up where I belonged, so my instincts took me to Birdland for another trip through memory lane with Nostalgic Natalie Douglas. The last time I had heard the dynamic Ms. Douglas was 14 months before when she powered her way through her historically and politically passionate Freedom Songs (see clip below).
This time, Natalie's nostalgic trip was a much more personal adventure she called Scrapbook 2.0, which traversed everything from the musical influences of her late parents to the tunes she loved while growing up in Southern California. By the time Douglas was finished flipping the pages of her musical scrapbook--and delivering some adorably homey stories along with them--my gloom had been transformed into gladness.
Douglas' new show was a part of impresario Jim Caruso's 10th year of his "Broadway at Birdland" series and was the 25th time Natalie has performed at the venue over eight years. She not only exudes a comfort level and intimacy with the room, she always seems to bring the Birdland audience to her ample bosom and nourishes them with her love for singing and her rich, effortless vocals, which features great range and a wonderful combination of jazz and pop influences. Douglas revved up the crowd from the outset with the up-tempo blues, "I'm Gonna Leave You," her obligatory tribute to her idol Nina Simone, and followed with a lovely homage to Linda Ronstadt on "Long, Long Time." She then surprised the audience with the fun, swinging country number, "Cow Cow Boogie," from--of all things--the 1942 Abbott and Costello film Ride 'Em Cowboy, and which has been sung by The Ink Spots, Ella Fitzgerald, and The Judds.
The power and intensity of the show and Douglas' vocals--which can turn from delicate to deceptively powerful on a dime--only grew stronger from there. She turned Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse's classic "Once In a Lifetime," into a tribute to all the Black recording stars (Sammy, Lena, Ray Charles, for example) who covered the song during the 1960s, almost as a personal statement. Then Douglas' entire band, including Musical Director/pianist Mark Hartman, Brian Nash on keyboards, Chris Biesterfeldt on guitar, Joe Choroszewski on drums, and especially Saadi Zain on bass, was ultra cool on the jazzy and rhythmic George and Ira Gershwin tune "Slap That Bass," from the 1937 Fred Astaire film Shall We Dance. The band then topped itself on a rich arrangement of Carly Simon and Jacob Brackman's "That's The Way I Always Heard It Should Be," supporting their singer's dramatic, soulful interpretation of a song that transitioned from an expression of disillusionment to self-doubt to independence.
Douglas' between songs patter has an unscripted, stream-of-consciousness quality that can be very funny and endearing, but also annoyingly manic and ditzy, as if she bogarted a joint at a party and couldn't stop babbling. As interesting and amusing as some of her family history anecdotes could be (as in speculating whether or not she might have been the love child of an affair between Doris Day and Willie Mays), I found myself wishing she would do an internal edit so she could add another song or two to the set. That quibble aside, she certainly woke me up on her emotional rendition of the love ballad "Sleepy Man," from the 1975 Broadway musical The Robber Bridegroom. But I really had to catch my breath when Douglas attached her power pop voice to John Waite's 1984 hit "Missing You." I've never been a big fan of the song, but Hartman's terrific arrangement with its slow, dramatic build allowed Natalie to put her stamp on the song and make it new, at least for me.
One song I do absolutely love is Elton John's "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" (from 1975's Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, the first album ever to debut at number one on the pop charts). As the second part of a medley with the Bonnie Raitt song "My First Night Alone," Douglas did a difficult song proud (and Hartman was dynamic on those familiar Elton John faux classical piano riffs). After completely soaring on "Someone Saved," her finale/encore combination of Abbey Lincoln's "Throw It Away," and the Eagles' "Take It To The Limit," seemed almost anti-climatic. Natalie Douglas didn't have to do much more to save my life that night. She had me at "Sugar Bear . . ." END
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