Customer Reviews

Early in the Morning/Deep Roots

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3 star:		(1)
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Lorez Alexandria was one of the most underrated jazz singers in American Music History! And she IS one of the best story tellers ever. Her diction, her phrasing is flawless and the lyrics are filled with pure meaning and feeling. She doesn't do any vocal gimmicks like others did. Dakota Staton (which I like a lot) very often did vocal gimmicks--even a Billie Holiday sometimes did it... But Lorez stays close to the music and the lyrics. Some listeners mix up vocal gimmicks with "emotional investment"... She could handle pure Jazz singing, as in "Deep Roots" with the unmatched version of "Nature Boy" and also sing the Blues so touching and effortless like on the second album "Early in the morning", on both occasions accompanied with fantastic musicians like Ramsey Lewis, Frank Wess, Al Grey, etc. As a bonus you get her legendary renditions of "Baltimore Oriole" (both 50s and 60s versions) She definitely was one of the Greats and was in the same row as the other Greats like Holiday, McRae etc. Enjoy an almost forgotten, but fantastic singer!

Deep Roots is a better album in my opinion than Early in the Morning (more upbeat). Lorez improvises with a lot of little trills and technically she is very good. However, she lacks conviction in her singing. Billie Holiday, Anita O`Day and Dakota Station have sung many of these songs while still conveying the meaning of the lyrics. With Lorez I feel she is just singing the words and they lack any true meaning. There seems to be no true emotional investment.