Search - Various Artists :: Stormy Weather: The Music of Harold Arlen

Producer Hal Willner has had an extraordinary career matching off-the-wall contemporary performers with some enchanted by-ways of American music, creating fresh visions of Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, and Disney soundtracks along the way. This is the soundtrack for a film of performances of Harold Arlen's music, a sequel to filmmaker Larry Weinstein's previous Willner collaboration, September Songs: The Music of Kurt Weill. Arlen was among the first of the great American songwriters to draw inspiration from jazz, a regard that's been returned in 70 years of reinterpretation. This collection has both the period novelty tunes and the great ballads. Arlen himself is heard in a 1955 recording of "Last Night When We Were Young," while "Minnie the Moocher's Wedding Day"--already too self-conscious for camp revision--is heard in its 1932 incarnation by the Boswell Sisters and the Dorsey Brothers. The character of Minnie turns up as well in "Kickin' the Gong Around," with David Johansen relishing the Cab Calloway role. Jimmy Scott wrings every ounce of bittersweet passion from both "I Had a Love Once" and a soaring, visionary "Over the Rainbow." Scott's vocal androgyny seems like a theme here, extending to Rufus Wainwright and Hawksley Workman. Debbie Harry overdubs a clever arrangement of "Stormy Weather" combined with "Ill Wind," summoning up more of Arlen's foreboding weather. Along with the stars, Willner provides opportunities for some great singers whose names might not be instantly recognizable. Ranee Lee's brilliant "Stormy Weather" touches on Lena Horne's original, while Mary Margaret O'Hara creates a quavering, swirling piece of original musical theater from "Blues in the Night." From Eric Mingus's ominous oration of "Get Happy" to Sandra Bernhard's earnest torch treatment of "Come Rain or Come Shine," Willner finds freshly entertaining ways for past and present to meet over a set of great tunes. --Stuart Broomer