Customer Reviews

Marni Nixon Sings Classic Kern

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Marni Nixon, perhaps best-known for dubbing Audrey Hepburn's singing in the film version of "My Fair Lady," turns in a simply magnificent performance here as she sings some of the finest pop songs ever written. The accompaniment by pianist Lincoln Mayorga and a small band is perfect and it is obvious that was a labor of love for both vocalist and ensemble. What keeps this from being a five star CD is the selection--some of the songs are not Kern standards, and considering the amount of classics Kern wrote, it seems that they could have chosen better songs than "Californ-i-ay" or "Go, Little Boat." However, this CD is a great collection of songs by one of the greatest songwriters of the first half of the twentieth century.

Marni Nixon's glorious voice will sound very, very familiar. Singing off-camera, she's the heart and soul of some of the world's favorite films--"The King and I" and "West Side Story" and "My Fair Lady". Here she steps into the spotlight at last to showcase an amazing treasury of beloved melodies and brilliant lesser-known songs by Jerome Kern. As sung by Ms. Nixon, this is a thrilling collection.

That voice!
Soaring, filled with joy and delight and tenderness. Beautiful and expressive. True and dazzling. Perfect.

Those songs!
Kern's gift for melody and form is genius. The chord progression for "All the Things You Are" for example is rightfully legendary; but the variety of music here is astonishing: ballad, jazz, operetta, ragtime, swing--all celebrating Joy and Love and Wisdom and Wit--and with brilliant lyrics from Dorothy Fields, Otto Harbach, Oscar Hammerstein II, even Ira Gershwin.

Listen to E. Yip Harburg's amazing lyric to "Cal-i-forn-i-ay" and you'll hear a song as witty and as laugh-out-loud hilarious as anything Harburg wrote for "The Wizard of Oz"! The song is from "Can't Help Singing"--a wonderful technicolor Deanna Durbin musical. I urge you to seek it out. This collection even resurrects another song cut from that film. The disc also includes a song called "I Have Seen" that Oscar Hammerstein II put to lyric after Kern's death. This is fascinating musical archaeology, and it makes this wonderful material shine!

All these songs are presented in inspired arrangements by Lincoln Mayorga for piano, strings, harp, woodwinds and percussion; and are outlined in concise definitive liner notes by Gerald Bordman.

Imagine the thrill and delight of hearing Eliza Dolittle, Maria, and Mrs. Anna sing again!

And, meet Marni Nixon.
Herself.
At last.

This Kern CD by Marni Nixon is truly magic! That beautiful soaring voice, the clarity of diction, the style, those wonderful arrangements. Some of the finest songs ever written including: "All the things you are", "If I could tell you", "Long ago and far away". One of my all time favorite CDs.

Jerome Kern is rightfully called the "Father of American Musical Theatre", but what most people don't realise is that 'Pop' Music owes as huge a debt to Mr. Kern as Broadway Musicals do. I'm not an American myself, but I think every young American should be made to listen to this album, to appreciate the beauty and charm of America's not-too-distant past.

I considered myself to be one of Marni Nixon's biggest fans as a lad, and now as an "adult", I daresay that I will always regard this CD as fondly as I do 20th century Fox's 'The Sound of the Music' and the other musical films that Marni contributed to.

Lincoln Mayorga does a tremendous deal to make this album special and memorable with his musical genius. When recordings songs by composers of yesteryear, it's very seldom that both the singer and the arranger respect the music as it was written, and both Marni and Nixon clearly respected Jerome Kern's artistic intentions, while making a number of these songs their very own here.