Lisa Rich

Long As You’re Living

Tritone

Jazz vocalist Lisa Rich returns after a long hiatus. You may recall her 2019 Highwire that we covered on these pages. That album was originally recorded in 1987 comprised of original songs by Chick Corea never recorded by a vocalist. Before that, Rich had already recorded two acclaimed albums, but since has long been sidelined with a debilitating illness, that until now, has made her fearful of performing. Having delivered a eulogy at her mother’s funeral, these fears began to ease.. She then sang at a jazz church in 2018 in front of 350 people and her confidence was further boosted by the encouragement of revolutionary free jazz vocalist, the late Jay Clayton, who co-produced this fine Long As You’re Living, Rich’s fourth album and one that marks her re-emergence as one of the more adventurous vocalists on the scene.

Clayton was co-producing, along with Rich and Grammy-winning engineer Bob Dawson, but succumbed to cancer before the album was completed.  Hence, the album is dedicated to her memory. Together the group had recruited the talented pianist, Marc Copland, who has well over forty albums as a leader and has worked with John Abercrombie, Gary Peacock, and Dave Stryker, among others as a sideman. Bassist Drew Gress (Phil Haynes, Dave Liebman), and trumpeter Dave Ballou (Joe Lovano, Dewey Redman, Maria Schneider) support with the latter appearing on six of the eleven trac. Notice the absence of a drummer, making the sound behind Rich’s warm, smoky, and well-informed jazz voice especially intimate on this program of well-chosen standards.

The title track, deeply meaningful to Rich who endured the death of close friend around the time of the recording, not to mention Clayton’s passing, is an upbeat swinger, buoyed by Ballou’s soaring trumpet turn, with lyrics that urge one to live life to the fullest. Rich is a skilled scatter, and we hear that immediately on this one and on various tunes that follow. On that same path of shunning negativity, Rich delivers Abbey Lincoln’s “Throw It Away” with a more deliberate flair than Lincoln’s powerful original, making the incisive lyrics that much more impactful. Both Gress and Copland are brilliantly sensitive in support. The show tune “When I Look in Your Eyes” is also deeply emotive, dedicated to a friend who recently endured the unexpected loss of her son.

Rich scats unbounded on Clayton’s “New Morning Blues,” with her wordless phrases based a on saxophone solo from Paul Desmond. We hear even more blissful scatting mixed with lyrics on a hip take of Joe Henderson’s “Isotope,” punctuated by Ballou’s muted trumpet. Her dramatic storytelling is on full display in Horace Silver’s “Lonely Woman” with Copland’s reharmonizations brightening the melancholy lyrics. Similarly, her rendering of Jimmy Rowles’ renamed “The Peacocks” to “A Timeless Place” (lyrics by Norman Winstone), is the essence of late-night, hand-on-very-word jazz. She also expressively delivers Monk’s “Ask Me Now” with lyrics from Jon Henricks, a tune that resonated because Rich experienced a similar situation. “Close Your Eyes” begins as warm ballad, and quickly evolves into a cool swinger, punctuated by Copland’s creative comping and soloing, Gress’s sturdy bass lines, as well as Rich’s scatting.

That same looseness and playful approach color her inventive reading of Fats Waller’s “Jitterbug Waltz” rendered in flirty whispering in some sections with Ballou’s trumpet by turns floating and sharp. Her unhurried delivery and subtle swing of chestnut “Bye Bye Blackbird” reflects the influence of Clayton and bebop vocal master Sheila Jordan with a stirring instrumental break from the full trio.  Rich closes with a mashup of “Haperchance,” a scat piece penned by Clayton into the atmospheric “Drifting Dreaming, with Don Read lyrics set to music from “Gymnopedie 1” by Erik Satie.

Rich finds a special balance between risk-taking and the kind of honest delivery only the experienced vocalists possess. She is so impressive that we’re left thinking what could have been, had she recorded more often in the intervening years. Let’s hope this is the start of many more that will follow.  This is surely among the top vocal albums of this year.

• Jim Hynes

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