Liza Minnelli ~ Liza's at the Palace: Broadway Show Cast Recording(Hybrid/Sire ***1/2)
Critics swoon at Van Morrison doing his classic Astral Weeks live in a recent album. It reconnects him with his muse, they say. Perhaps. But few live sessions sparkle with an artist's brass and sass as does Liza's at the Palace, a brashly triumphant document of Liza Minnelli's autumn 2008 run at the Palace Theatre on Broadway. To quote her, "It's Liza with a Z Not Lisa with an S 'Cause Lisa with an S Goes 'sss' not 'zzz.' "
The two-CD set is split between signature smashes and her salute to 1940s Broadway/nightclub doyenne Kay Thompson (Liza's godmother). Minnelli goes for broke on belters such as "Maybe This Time" with delicious clarity. Sympathetic pianist Billy Stritch and a smallish orchestra allow her room to breathe. She saves the scenery-chewing for the soft, dramatic subtlety of "If You Hadn't, But You Did" and the steady sorrow of "But the World Goes 'Round."
Along with the recent The Complete A&M Recordings, which documents her late-'60s/pre-disco '70s, Palace represents a mountainous high peak in a career with more valleys than the Dolls.
- A.D. Amorosi
The two-CD set is split between signature smashes and her salute to 1940s Broadway/nightclub doyenne Kay Thompson (Liza's godmother). Minnelli goes for broke on belters such as "Maybe This Time" with delicious clarity. Sympathetic pianist Billy Stritch and a smallish orchestra allow her room to breathe. She saves the scenery-chewing for the soft, dramatic subtlety of "If You Hadn't, But You Did" and the steady sorrow of "But the World Goes 'Round."
Along with the recent The Complete A&M Recordings, which documents her late-'60s/pre-disco '70s, Palace represents a mountainous high peak in a career with more valleys than the Dolls.
- A.D. Amorosi
Philadelphia Inquirer ~ philly.com
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