1. All For Love
2. Get Happy
3. Love Hurts
4. Begin The Beguine
5. Cheek to Cheek
6. Get On It Sam
7. The Very Thought Of You
8. Breaking Up is Hard to Do
9. Moondance
10. Love for Sale
11. High Love
12. Time after Time
13. All The Things You Are
Clare Teal - Vocals, backing vocals
Dennis Rollins - Trombone (tracks 1, 6)
James Watson - Piano, organ
Simon Little - Bass (tracks 1-12)
Chris Dagley - Drums, percussion (tracks 1-12)
A. D. Chivers - Percussion, backing vocals
(tracks 1, 2, 5, 6, 9)
Colin Ball - Backing vocals (tracks 5, 6,
9)
On the plus side, Clare Teal
has a good, full voice and she sings in tune.
She's a composer as well as a singer - having
co-written tracks 1, 6 and 11 with Amanda
Field. Most of the other songs are familiar
vehicles for jazz vocalists - indeed, several
of them have been heard so often as to be
hackneyed. Haven't we heard enough versions
of Moondance? And, lovely as they are,
songs like Cheek to Cheek and All
the Things You Are can hardly be called
rarities. An untutored reviewer on the Amazon
website refers to Love for Sale as
"seldom-heard" but it had been recorded by
nearly 100 artists and groups by 1995 and
has often been heard since.
Does Clare add anything new
in her interpretations of these old friends?
Mostly not, although she at least sings the
verse of Love For Sale - but otherwise
her gently Latin-American version of the song
is little different from dozens of others.
And Clare sounds cheerful rather than sad
or defiant.
In fact cheerfulness is a
hallmark of most of Clare's performances on
this CD. This matches the album title and
it suits some of the songs, but not all of
them. For instance, the mood of Breaking
Up is Hard to Do should be poignant but
Clare gives it a neutral interpretation, without
any heartfelt emotion. Some other tracks sound
merely bland. Clare's sleeve-notes admit that
the opening original, All For Love,
is inspired by the "lounge regime most prominent
in the 1950s". It is reminiscent of a show
song like Hernando's Hideaway, especially
with the cooing girly chorus in the background.
Only Dennis Rollins' gruff trombone adds a
bit of grit.
The title track has an arrangement
modelled on that used in the 1950 musical
film Summer Stock, but why try to reproduce
something that Judy Garland made "one of the
highlights of her career" (Stanley Green)?
Clare's performance has none of the Garland
magic or charisma. Perhaps this sums up my
misgivings about the whole album. The Teal
approach is bright and cheerful but it lacks
much character or depth.
Tony Augarde
CD Reviews
W14
Music/Universal 176 1246
