Search - Susannah Mccorkle :: Sabia

Brazilian influence - unusual for Suzannah - superb

Peter Durward Harris | Leicester England | 07/28/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Susannah's lovely, bluesy voice is heard in a slightly different setting to normal here, with a touch of the bossa nova. Reading other reviewers, there is not enough bossa nova for fans of that music, but maybe that wasn't Susannah's intention. Susannah wanted to keep her loyal fans, while giving them something a little different.Perhaps the biggest difference is that she sometimes sings in foreign languages - the opening Tristeza begins in Portugese then switches to Italian - but many of the songs are in English. I used to avoid foreign language recordings, but I learned the error of my ways - when you have a singer with an expressive voice, it doesn't really matter. If you play a record sung in English, do you listen to every word. No, of course not - at least not every time. Sometimes you play music as a background to whatever else you are doing.Some of the songs have been translated into English, although Susannah wrote new lyrics for one song (P'ra machucar meu coracao) because a direct translation would have been awkward. Writing new lyrics instead of translating originals is nothing new - it happened a lot in the sixties and probably before then.This is probably not the CD to begin a Susannah collection with, but it is a lovely album which most Susannah fans will appreciate. Of course, if your only interest in Susannah is her Great American Songbook recordings, you won't find them here - but there are plenty of those (I've got them all) and this makes a nice change."