Review: AN INTIMATE EVENING WITH DAVID MARINO Grabs Hearts at Pangea

“This is going to sound weird, but he reminds me of Judy Garland.”  

That was me, speaking to my table mate during the applause at the David Marino show at Pangea on February 12th.  Said table mate, a redoubtable singer in his own right, raised his eyebrows and nodded to me in agreement.  It isn’t that David Marino is trying to be like, or even IS like the legendary singer considered to be the greatest entertainer of all time… but there is a quality that they both share.   The cleanliness of the performance.  The purity of the voice.  The sincerity of the personality.  There isn’t anything false or contrived in anything that David Marino does on the stage.  The same could be said of Judy Garland when she was in concert.  After the evening had concluded and my companion and I were walking down the street, doing our usual post-cabaret show debrief, he said to me, “That’s a voice that hasn’t been ruined by voice teachers.”  I knew what he meant.  I’ve read the story of the time that Barbra Streisand went to a voice teacher who urged her to sing “A Sleepin’ Bee” in a manner that she found affected, so she left and never had another voice lesson.  Whether David Marino has had voice lessons or whether his voice is the way it is naturally, may nothing ever be done to change it.  Or him, for that matter, because he is equally pure and clean in his persona: a crooner, he may be, but he isn’t slick.  He isn’t a lounge lizard.  This is more like watching Huck Finn sing Sinatra - and it works.  It really works.

So let’s talk about the show, shall we?

The artwork for February 12th at Pangea said AN INTIMATE EVENING WITH DAVID MARINO, and, boy howdy, isn’t that what we got?  It’s no secret that I have a particular fondness for the downtown cabaret room in the back of a restaurant.  It is the coziest, homiest club in town, and when I walked through the door on Tuesday night, I felt the joy rising up in my chest, I felt the grin growing greater on my face.  The pretty glow of the lights, the warm air (both literal and figurative), and the sincere smile of Stephen Shanaghan all made a cold winter night more bearable.  Once inside of the cabaret room, the smells coming from the kitchen were akin to walking through the best cooking show on TV, and the plates of food that could be seen being served around the room looked like something out of a culinary magazine.  If there were a scratch-and-sniff feature possible online on a website like this one, readers would flock to the restaurant just for a meal.  But Pangea is much more than just a meal, and the David Marino show was a perfect example of how and why.  The room is, indeed, intimate, so much so that when David’s best gal pal, Ava Nicole Frances, cheered for him from her seat in the front row, the rest of the audience could see him blush as he threw her a high five and a playful wink.  For several people in the room, it was clear, David Marino is a must-see that they have already seen.  For some of us (like the two people at my table) this was our first gander at the guy from Montreal.  It will not be our last.  Now there are two more people for whom David Marino is a must-see.  All of the boxes are checked off when the gentleman is on the stage - the charm of his unpretentious personality, the tone and timbre of his instrument, and the feeling engaged during the telling of his musical tales.  There was no need for an excess of patter during his performance because his commitment to the music, to the genre of music, to the intention of the lyricists is what leads him; his dedication to this catalogue and to these songs is as visible as the face across which his feelings are displayed.  There is nothing coy, there is no disguise, there is only honesty - and when he does have something to say, it is always witty, charming, and from the heart.

For his hour-long debut at Pangea, Mr. Marino stuck to the classics… mostly.  There was plenty of Gershwin and Berlin and McHugh and Rodgers, and it is apparent that that is exactly where David Marino lives.  But there was a little Paul McCartney that stood out as a promise of things to come - maybe some John Bucchino or Julie Gold is in his future, maybe some Billy Joel or Sara Bareilles, who knows?  It doesn’t really matter because it’s clear that whatever David Marino sings, it’s going to sound spectacular.  This is one of the beautiful voices.  And he doesn’t bog himself down with a lot of interpretation, either, he keeps it clean and lets the composer, his musical director, and his connection to the lyric lead the way.  How else could David Marino have thawed out this writer’s winter-cold heart and left me in tears twice in one hour, once with a breathtaking “Where Is Love?” from Oliver! and once with a simple yet stunning “I Got Lost In His Arms” from Annie Get Your Gun - and I have to admit (shamefacedly) that the latter is not a song to which I usually gravitate… and, still, David Marino had me in a puddle at my table - impressive, to say the least.  Even when not being reduced to tears, though, this was a performance filled with feelings (how perfect, for Valentine’s Day), from the wistful and romantic medley “You’re Nearer/Je Ne Pourrai Jamais Vivre Sans Toi” to the jauntily optimistic “On The Sunny Side of The Street,” with standout moments coming from the legacies of Jacques Brel (“If We Only Have Love”) and Edith Piaf (“La Vie En Rose”), both performances powerful in Marino’s control, also employed for evening highlight, a performance of “Caruso” dedicated to his grandparents.   And when not leaning into the lyrical and emotional, Mr. Marino was all smiles, pep, and bounce, particularly with the Charles Aznavour-penned “For Me… Formidable” (sensational) and the splendidly arranged “Exactly Like You,” which included some delectable scat-singing from the jazz proficient.  And on the subject of arrangements, Musical Director John DiMartino and Bassist Yoshi Waki brought the room to life by impeccably executing a series of exciting treatments, like the one for the aforementioned McCartney number “Maybe I’m Amazed” - musically speaking, from every vantage point, the evening was an unquestionable success, indeed, beyond reproach, under the watchful eye of director Andy Gale.  This writer can find not one note, not one suggestion, not one tiny bit of constructive criticism.  It was pretty obvious that what we were all watching was something special, and since David Marino has been hitting the boards here in New York City for a minute, now, it looks like this special moment is all his.  I hope it’ll last.  I hope it’ll last a good, long time.

Find other great shows to see on the Pangea website HERE.

Visit the David Marino website HERE.

Photos by Stephen Mosher

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