Learning to Listen: Get hip to Marlena Shaw

Many critics and fans have labeled singers whose work is tinged with certain elements of darkness and light as successors to Billie Holiday. While many a singer has saluted her through tributes and homages she is a singular talent whose impact is difficult to approximate. She arrived early enough in the jazzification of popular music, between jazz of the late 1920s and the commercial big band “swing” of the 1940s to have reshaped the way new generations of singers have approached lyrics, rhythm, melody, and coloration. 

Less attention has been paid to singers who have fused aspects of blues, swing, and gospel seamlessly in the manner of the great Dinah Washington. This oversight is understandable since her imprint on what became known as R &B and soul singing is so prominent its almost invisible. Influenced by Holiday, as well as gospel singers from her upbringing and classic blues singers (e.g., Bessie Smith), Washington has profoundly influenced R&B oriented jazzers like Ernestine Anderson, Kay Starr, Diane Schuur, Dakota Staton, and Nancy Wilson, as well as more R&B associated vocalists like Aretha Franklin. During the 1940s she scored 14 hits on the R&B charts and had even greater success in the late 1950s-1960s with 32 charting hits. At this time categories of jazz, R&B, and pop were a bit more fluid.

By the mid-1960s, however, the boundaries between black and white music, and adult and teen music grew more rigid. Black popular music became far more associated with R&B and soul which created a dilemma for emerging singers steed in multiple fields. Franklin famously struggled to find a sound and an audience at Columbia during her six-year stint until recording in a more R&B focused style at Atlantic. While soul music became her signature style other singers of her generation straddled the soul and jazz worlds with more mixed results.

Marlena Shaw’s first full length jazz album is 1987’s It Is Love a classic recorded live at Hollywood’s famous jazz club Vine Street Bar & Grill.

The singer who most embodies the Washington ethos, and its liminal commercial place since the 1960s, is the vastly underrated Marlena Shaw. Born in New Rochelle, New York in 1942, Shaw’s debut album, 1967’s Out of Different Bags, was released four years after Washington’s death and the same year Franklin hit with “Respect” and Otis Redding with “Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay.” Shaw’s repertoire is mostly standard material and showtunes including “I Stayed too Long at the Fair” and “Matchmaker, Matchmaker.” Her actual singing is quite arresting and a few tunes, such as her take on jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal’s “Ahmad’s Blues,” are intriguing but its an undistinguished recording. Too many of the songs have stock arrangements that inhibit her or are ephemeral tunes (“It Sure is Groovy”) that fail to represent her gifts. Like Washington, Shaw is a great improviser whose rhythmic and tonal embellishment modernize her material and personalize them.

1969’s The Spice of Life inches closer to Shaw’s capabilities. The original “Woman of the Ghetto” and her cover of Nina Simone’s “I Wish I Knew (How It Would Feel to be Free)” capture the racial and cultural climate of the time effectively, and she is aces on modern R&B fare like “Stormy Monday.” Her defining moment is her first recording of Carole King and Gerry Giffin’s “Go Away Little Boy” which she punctuates with dramatic elements, including gospel inspired verbal asides, and percussive choices that transform it from pop fare Steve Lawrence sang (as “Go Away Little Girl”) into a soulful epic. Nearly a decade later she revisited it (“Yu Mama/Go Away Little Boy”) beginning with a three-minute monologue on existential romantic disappointment as part of a nearly 7-minute version on her Columbia set Sweet Beginnings. It became her cornerstone song and its salty, knowing tone came to define her as a unique voice. Her spoke-sung style prefigured the “rapping” style of soul singers like Millie Jackson, Shirley Murdock, and Betty Wright.

By the 1970s Shaw was caught in a stylistic morass. Whereas her two albums at Cadet positioned her awkwardly in the jazz-soul vein, without generating much commercial success, her recordings for Blue Note and Columbia further confused things. Her Blue Note albums are essentially late 1960s adult R&B and her Columbia records integrate funk and disco. While she is an undeniably appealing and versatile vocalist her talents ran deeper than the surface pleasures of cocktail soul and dance tunes. Buried beneath the gloss was a jazz-oriented singer with more brains and chops than her routine material could contain.

After bouncing between record labels, it took her awhile to find her groove on record. The first album to capture her dynamic persona and formidable musicality is her Verve debut 1987’s It Is Love. Singing before a live audience in tune with her vibe she modernizes warhorses like “Nobody Knows you When You’re Down and Out” (in a medley with Sinatra’s “That’s Life”), “Unforgettable,” and “At Last,” and soars on her signature “Go Away.” One listen and you wonder why she isn’t a superstar beyond the cognoscenti.

Shaw came into her own as an interpreter, songwriter, and pianist on the endearing Dangerous recorded for Concord Jazz.

Her 1996 Concord Jazz debut Dangerous showcases her gifts as a composer, interpreter, and musician (she plays piano on an original gospel tune). Though her tone occasionally evokes Ernestine Anderson she has a unique way with a song finding her own groove in well-known standards like “Out of this World,” “Close Enough for Love,” and “The Nearness of You.” Her approach often involves subtle modifications of the lyric that make them more conversational and a rhythmic approach that is both swinging and funky. She also veers into more specialized material including Benny Golson’s “Whisper Not” (interesting) and Alec Wilder and Loonis McGohon’s “Blackberry Winter” (respectably performed but maudlin). Though its unlikely her original tunes will become standards they work for her and keep the program moving. If a few tunes drag there is enough variety to maintain your interest including a sizzling take on the Philly soul standard “You Make me Feel Brand New” with Kevin Mahogany and her satisfying gospel closer “Keep in Trustin.’”

No fluke she continued her momentum on 1997’s Elemental Soul which has a higher ratio of standards to originals but no shortage of the soul-jazz style she embodies. Shaw knows what works for her hence she kicks things off with a slinky version of Mose Allison’s “Your Mind is on Vacation” and finds new depths in romantic fare like Irving Berlin’s “How Deep is the Ocean” and the pathos of the modern standard “Where Do you Start.” Like Washington she has the capacity to sing anything well. When she is able to sing superior material that challenges and stimulates her she applies elements of her formidable toolkit smartly to locate its core meaning making it uniquely Shawed. Since recording 2002’s Live in Tokyo and 2003’s Lookin’ for a Love on the independent label Eighty-Eights Shaw has made few appearances on record and has retired from performing.  

Shaw’s ability to modernize and personalize everything she sings from her originals to well known standards is in full effect on 1997’s Elemental Soul.

The digitization of various record label catalogs has made previously obscure recordings more accessible though some genres survive largely through CDs. As many of vocal jazz’s greats who have had decades of notoriety have entered into their 80s and 90s, such as the great Andy Bey and Sheila Jordan, respectively, hopefully we can shine some light on singers who started in a less jazz-friendly climate and persisted to record some great vocal art nonetheless.

COPYRIGHT © 2021 VINCENT L. STEPHENS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.