Sharón Clark

The Metropolitan Room
Jan 28, 30, Feb. 1-2

Lately, it's been a trend for jazz and cabaret singers to venture beyond the comfort zone of the traditional Great American Songbook and into the enemy camp—i.e., pop and rock songs from 1960 onward. Though not necessarily a bad idea, too many singers fall into the trap of merely "covering," rather than interpreting, jukebox hits. The brilliant Sharón Clark, however, knows how to personalize the songs of Motown or the Beatles, no less than if they were by Gershwin or Rodgers, and offers an object lesson in how to revitalize someone else's vintage hit in such a way that the original artist suddenly becomes the furthest thing from the listener's mind. Her most recent album, "Do It Again," is a wonderful set of songbook standards, but her show at the Metro of songs from her AM radio youth is an absolute triumph.

Sharón Clark Alan Nahigian

Why do otherwise creative jazz and cabaret singers suddenly become mere wedding-band entertainers when the source material changes from Cole Porter to Smokey Robinson? This is where Sharón Clark excels: Her approach is firmly rooted in the pantheon of jazz singers, particularly Carmen McRae and especially Sarah Vaughan. Like the latter, her natural sound is almost operatic in its richness, but pure jazz in its improvisational sassiness. But when she brings her remarkable instrument to bear on those pop hits of the post-nuclear age, which she clearly loves, she creates something new and amazing.

That's not to say she's without precedent. Back in the day, artists such as Vaughan, McRae and Ella Fitzgerald occasionally sang things like "The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game," but they tended to sound like they were slumming. Not always, though: When Vaughan delivered a powerful reading of Paul Williams's "Rainy Days and Mondays" on her classic 1973 live album from Japan, it was all the more remarkable for being so unexpected. With her superior musicianship and deep experience, Vaughan outclassed the song's originator, the prodigiously gifted Karen Carpenter, but now Ms. Clark, who apparently grew up assimilating the idioms of both Carpenter and Vaughan, has crafted an interpretation that does justice to them both.

Time after time, when comparing Ms. Clark's renditions with the originals, her re-imaginings are superior. She makes a winning speech about how her love of James Taylor is shared by a fellow African-American born in 1961, Barack Obama. She transforms "Tears on My Pillow" from doo-wop into a country soul anthem, à la Ray Charles (like she says, "Love is not a gadget"), with musical director Chris Gasso replicating the licks Brother Ray played on "The Three Bells."

Indeed, the closest thing here to a show tune is "Give a Little Whistle" (from "Pinocchio"), which Ms. Clark makes both jaunty and soulful, with an opportunity (that she doesn't abuse) for scatting rather than whistling. She winds up with "Goodbye Charlie," a 1964 movie theme and a jazz waltz of the kind Marilyn Maye specializes in.

She encores with "That Sunday, That Summer," a song that, like Ms. Clark herself, is both wonderful and hitherto neglected. All of which begs an additional question: Why has Sharón Clark been so overlooked, particularly in New York, for all this time? That is surely going to change. After all, what she's got they used to call the blues.

Cyrus Chestnut 50th Birthday

Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola
Broadway at 60th Street, (212) 258-9595
Through Sunday

The imposing pianist, his playing as saturated as ever in both gospel and bebop, turned 50 last week. As Mr. Chestnut arrived on the stage at Dizzy's for his late set on opening night, the rest of his quartet—saxophonist Stacy Dillard, bassist Dezron Douglas and drummer Neal Smith—saluted him with a modernistic chorus of "Happy Birthday." He opened the set with fast-paced hard-bop numbers like Mr. Douglas's "What's Happenin'" and his own "Scuttlebut," a frantic piece that takes its cue from the title. As the evening progressed, Mr. Dillard switched from tenor to soprano and the mood grew more relaxed, with a lovely ballad called "Intimacy" and a majestic "Body and Soul"; even "Giant Steps" sounded comparatively tender. Could it be that the redoubtable Mr. Chestnut is mellowing with age? This should make his two-night collaboration with sax legend Jimmy Heath, who joins the quartet Friday and Saturday, all the more special.

Sammy Miller & the Congregation

Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola
Broadway at 60th Street, (212) 258-9595
Through Saturday

It's time to admit it: Modern jazz focuses too much on original tunes that were barely worth originating to begin with and marathon solos that test audience endurance. The Congregation, comprising six players between the ages of 21 and 23, is the rare bop-centric jazz ensemble that performs with the energy, togetherness and near-manic drive to entertain (a sound lately associated with younger traditional jazz bands like the Hot Sardines and Baby Soda). The group's late-night set on Tuesday began with Oliver Nelson's "Hoe Down," rendered as if for a simultaneous revival meeting and square dance, and a catchy "Let There Be Love" inspired by George Shearing. Drummer-leader Sammy Miller promised to conclude with a hit song of the '60s—by which he meant the 1860s and "Battle Hymn of the Republic." Here's one young band that won't be playing the Stone anytime soon, thank God.

Misha Piatigorsky and Sketchy Black Dog

1650 Broadway, (212) 582-2121

Here's another ensemble that explores the crosscurrents of various strands of contemporary music—with elements of pop, jazz and classical music all constantly bouncing off one another—and, in the process, endeavors to make jazz more accessible. Russian pianist Misha Piatigorsky leads a group that consists of a power trio, with bassist Danton Boller and heavy, rockish drummmer Chris Wabich (in a manner reminiscent of the Bad Plus), juxtaposed against a traditional string quartet. The result is a sound that can be described as an ongoing brawl of a mash-up, at once carefully organized and totally freewheeling, not just of individual numbers, but entire genres, as heard on "Eleanor Rigby," "Purple Haze" and "Light My Fire."

Marin Mazzie

54 Below

Your first reaction might be: "So why is one of the pre-imminent musical-theater sopranos of our generation lavishing her resplendent chops on such animalistic bubble-gum fare as the Monkees and the Partridge Family?" The answer is, in a well-timed parallel to Sharón Clark's offering at the Metropolitan, not only because the pop songs of the 1970s are the music Ms. Mazzie grew up with (before she "graduated" to Cole Porter and Sondheim), but because she sings them extraordinarily well. Weaving the music into a colorful narrative about her adolescence (with particular attention to the multifaceted uses of her purple hairbrush), she opens these simple songs into a panoply of high drama and comedy that proves gold is where you find it. She makes "That's The Way I've Always Heard It Should Be" into as complex and moving a personal aria as "Mr. Snow" from "Carousel."