Search - Lena Horne :: At the Waldorf Astoria / At the Sands

LENA HORNE: A FORCE OF NATURE

Santo Giglio | BROCKPORT, NY | 06/08/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"AT LAST THE PERFORMANCE OF MISS HORNE AT THE WALDORF & THE SANDS ON CD. THIS ONE IS DEFINITELY WORTH HAVING! NOT ENOUGH WORDS TO SAY WHAT A GREAT TALENT SHE IS AND AN AMERICAN TREASURE. SHE IS SIMPLY THE VERY BEST AND THESE PERFORMANCES PROVE IT."

The Making of a Legend

Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 05/17/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"When the smoke clears, it would appear that Lena Horne's primary legacy was her cabaret act, which "At the Waldorf Astoria" made available to millions of record buyers in the early years of the vinyl LP (RCA proclaimed it the largest-selling recording by a female vocalist that the company had ever released). The recording captures that curious mix of anger, danger, explosiveness, tenacity, risk, excitement that were all part of the Horne persona in her night club acts. What she may have lacked in natural gifts--the range of an Ella or Sarah, the utterly unforced yet compelling musical rhetoric of a Lady Day or Peggy Lee--she makes up for with formidable acting skills. In fact, so persuasive is she that it's difficult to know whether the dynamo we experience on this recording is a carefully crafted persona or the real deal, the authentic Horne self.



Certainly, it had to be a mixture of the two. Sinatra writer Will Friedwald recently commented that the first thing that struck him upon meeting her in person was her small stature compared to the image he had of her from the recordings and stage. All the more evidence that she had learned how to "play big"--whether in physical stature or vocal power. And where did she learn the skills of magnification and amplification? Certainly, she'd gotten a lot of her show business instincts from her mother, a performer, and her "apparent" recklessness on stage might be seen as a vestige inherited from her father, a gambler. And her last husband Lennie Hayton provided the kinds of musical arrangements that took full advantage of her theatrical strong points--and just in time for the birth of the long-playing record. But more than anyone, it was Billy Strayhorn who had the sense of style and, above all, presentation that, over their four-decade relationship, he managed to pass on to his best learner and "A" student. Not least of all, he taught her to complement her cabaret projection with the musicality associated with the best jazz artists.



There's still an elusive inscrutability about Lena that suggests that this gorgeous apparition Ed Sullivan customarily introduced as "the first Negro star" may also have been the last of the great divas in American entertainment. I could quickly refute Ed with names like Ella, Billie, and Ethel Waters. But the latter, who introduced "Stormy Weather" with an emotional wallop that assured it would be around long enough to serve as Lena's signature song, generates a single paragraph on the allmusic website whereas Lena receives no fewer than 16 small-print pages! Coincidentally, the keenly intelligent and equally "edgy" cabaret star, Eartha Kitt (her facial sculpture Orson Welles thought so highly enough he cast her as Helen of Troy in a Broadway production)--died not long before Lena. And she, too, was a "survivor"--agile of mind and body up to the end. But Eartha (like Lena a frequent political lightning rod) was perceived by the public, perhaps unfairly, as less of a three-dimensional person than a "type," lacking the depth, complexity, and sincerity of Lena Horne (we always knew Lena "meant it," even if when the "it" wasn't entirely clear. The appearance may belie the reality, but when it comes to legends--whether fait accompli or in-the-making--appearances count a lot--in fact, sometimes for everything. If not, then I'm wrong in suggesting that the term "Great American Diva" simply doesn't work with Eartha like it does with Lena."