CD Review: Sinne Eeg - Dreams

Sinne Eeg (vocal); Jacob Christoffersen (piano); Larry Koonse (guitar); Scott Colley (bass); Joey Baron (drums).

(Review by Lance).

Considered the pre-eminent jazz vocalist in Scandinavia, Danish singer Eeg and fellow Dane Christoffersen touched down in Brooklyn and teamed up with three top names on the American jazz scene to record an album that will serve well her ambition to achieve wider recognition on the world stage - a stage that's already overcrowded with female voices. 

Nevertheless, Eeg has the voice for it. Swings lightly, scats gently, takes liberties with the melody, but no more than say Anita O'Day or Sarah Vaughan did and, on top of that, she wrote 6 of the 10 songs, one in cahoots with Mads Mathias - Head Over High Heels. There's also a couple of Cole Porter's (What is This Thing Called Love? & Anything Goes), Rodgers and Hart (Falling in Love With Love) and De Paul and Raye chip in with I'll Remember April. Eeg's songs hold up well alongside those by these GASBOOK GANG heavies.
Aleppo is perhaps the most poignant song I've ever heard. Recent events in Syria provide the background - no! the foreground - to this heartrending saga of man's inhumanity to man and the devastating effect on children unable to comprehend the world they've been born in to. Just as Strange Fruit was, back in the 1930s, Aleppo is as much a social commentary as it is a song. I'm fighting back the tears as I type. (See video below).
I'll Remember April lightens the gloom with some relaxed scatting and Larry Koonse contributes a delicate solo.
Anything Goes swings along with nice piano by Christoffersen, more scatting and some new lyrics by the singer:
There was a time when talent mattered 
when singers were being flattered 
on TV shows, 
now anything goes.
And so on...Take it from me - talent matters here and Sinne Eeg has it in abundance.
Available December 1 on Stunt STUCD17112 with UK distribution by Discovery.
Samples.
Lance.
Video.