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Shades of Whyte
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AUDIPHILE RECORDS ACD-353 [58:52]
This Song is You
Isn’t That The Thing To Do?
It’s Time For Love
Nina Never Knew
I Love The Way You Dance
Linger Awhile
Love Me Tomorrow
I’ll Close My Eyes
I’ll Tell You What
Blame It On The Movies
Some Of My Best Friends Are The Blues
Medley: A Little Samba/So Danco Samba
For Heaven’s Sake
I’m Old Fashioned
Too Late Now
Dancing In The Dark
Ronny Whyte (piano, vocals and Arrangements): Boots Maleson (bass): Sean Harksness (guitar): Alex Nguyen (trumpet): Lou Caputo (tenor sax and flute): Mauricio De Souza and David Silliman (drums, alternating tracks)
Recorded at Teaneck Sound Studio, New Jersey, 12 and13 December 2016
Doubtless Ronny Whyte would baulk at the description ‘veteran’ but the pianist and singer has a solid discography to his name over many years and like Audiphile stable-mate Marlene ver Planck he shows no sign of slowing down. The epitome of the versatile supper club and cabaret cum jazz performer, Whyte has surrounded himself with sidemen who add variety to the fine 16-track sequence. Five of these cuts are his own compositions but the names Kern, Duke (Vernon, not Ellington), Burton Lane, Arthur Schwartz and others show a seasoned approach to the repertoire. With space for tenor sax and trumpet, either solo or as obbligato, Whyte exercises the discretion to sit out and be supportive on the piano, comping with discretion.
Whyte has an easy-swinging, slightly Sinatraesque approach to things. Both playing the piano and singing and working within the context of a small band imposes its own discipline but Whyte is thoroughly on top of things, generous with his offering the trumpet obbligato to Alex Nguyen on The Song is You, for example, though here I don’t think he should have scatted so prominently; not his finest hour. Lou Caputo’s tenor double is flute, which he puts to good use on Blossom Dearie’s Isn’t That the Thing to Do? though unless he’s a quick changer I assume there was some overdubbing on Whyte’s It’s Time for Love. When it comes to his own compositions Whyte is able to draw on all his rich experience and craft a piece most suited for the milieu; a case in point, is I Love the Way You Dance, which is something Sinatra could easily have taken on. It has that aura about it. Perhaps a samey approach sometimes bedevils things. Vernon Duke’s Love Me Tomorrow sounds desperate to break free from both tempo and arrangement. Once in a while Whyte segues into bluesy mode; with a little hipper presentation I’ll Tell You What could have been fertile territory for Mose Allison – it already has a Mose-like title – but he does dig down in the supper club tristesse of Some of My Best Friends are Blues.
A Latino Samba medley adds variety of texture and rhythm but Whyte chooses to end the back nine with a trio of classics by Kern, Lane and Schwartz, wittily prefacing and ending I’m Old Fashioned with some old fashioned Classical pianistics of his own. It’s a charmer.
Jonathan Woolf