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| Roseanna Vitro: Listen Here: Skyline Records 2001 |
In 1982, an unheralded
vocalist, recorded a debut album with her soon to be husband, recording
engineer Paul Wickliffe, at his Skyline Studios in New York City. The album was
titled Listen Here and the singer’s name was Roseanna Vitro. The album
was eventually released in 1985 and it featured the gorgeous, supple, and
adventurous voice of Vitro accompanied by a stellar band that included pianist
Kenny Barron, bassist Buster Williams and the drummer Ben Riley. The album also
featured her mentor, Texas tenor Arnett Cobb on three cuts, percussion by
Brazilian drummer Duduka Da Fonseca on two cuts, and pianist Bliss Rodriguez
and guitarist Scott Hardy on one cut each.
After a varied
and impressive career as both a performer and an educator, Vitro revisited her
earlier work and decided that it might be the right time to reintroduce this
album to another generation. In January of this year, the reissued album,
Listen Here, almost forty years after it was recorded, is once again available.
To a new generation of vocal jazz fans, as well as to some of us old aficionados
who might have missed this vocalist’s past work, the album is a confirmation of
how Roseanna Vitro’s body of work is an important wellspring to be explored, a
rewarding slice of jazz vocal history.
Vitro has certainly
led an interesting life. She was born in Hot Springs, Arkansas in 1954 and had
been introduced to music by her father John Vitro, a nightclub proprietor whose
musical tastes favored Opera, and her mother Ruby, who was a member of a southern
gospel singing group. Besides these influences, the environment was conducive to
a young singing Vitro to become exposed to and assimilate the musical elements
of the blues and the rural south’s hoedown music.
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| Roseanna Vitro ( photo credit unknown) |
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| Arnett Cobb ( photo credit unknown) |
There has
never been grass growing under this energetic woman’s feet. She studied opera, jazz, Brazilian music,
Indian vocal techniques, and piano. She developed working relationships with pianists
Fred Hersch, who arranged her Listen Here album and played on her
A Quiet Place with clarinet/saxophonist Eddie Daniels in 1987.
The pianist Kenny Werner worked on several of her other albums, including a Ray
Charles tribute, Catchin’ Some Rays with saxophonist David “Fathead”
Newman in 1997. She attracted the attention of TV host and jazz fan Steve Allen,
who wrote the liner notes for this re-issue, and who produced a record of Vitro
singing his music. Released in 1999 that album was titled The Times of My
Life: The Music of Steve Allen.
Over her
career. Vitro has released fourteen albums, including Conviction: Thoughts of Bill Evans with longtime Evans bassist Eddie Gomez in 2001. She received
a Best of Jazz Vocal Album Grammy nomination in 2012 for her album The Music of Randy Newman.
This vibrant vocalist became an important vocal educator in 1995 as a Director of Jazz Studies at New Jersey City University and later at SUNY Purchase until she departed in 2002. The woman’s drive has been insatiable, as her publicist says Vitro is “passionate and spirited.”
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| Kenny Barron, Buster Williams, Ben Riley (photo credit unknown) |
Vitro’s passion and spirit is obviously present in huge measures on her album Listen Here. The music starts off with a Jobim song “No More Blues,” where her confident, elastic vocals float over the band’s vibrant rhythm and her impeccable timing is accentuated by a superb scat section.
On the
classic 1938 popular song “You Go to My Head,” Vitro handles the dreamy love
song with a fearless, almost musical theater-like audacity. She allows her voice
to modulate effortlessly with the changes and the trio of Barron, Williams and
Riley play with such authority and verve that the song just glows.
“Centerpiece”
finds the honkytonk piano chair occupied by Bliss Rodriguez and features a barrelhouse
solo by Texan tenor Arnett Cobb. Cobb’s gritty horn inspires Vitro to strut some
of her own formidable blues credentials and gospel-influenced soul.
Duke
Ellington’s “Love You Madly” is a swinging vehicle for Vitro and for the band
to show off their musical harmoniousness. It is a joy to hear Cobb’s blustery saxophone
and Vitro’s marvelously pliable instrument to converse in an inspired call and
respond action that brims with joy. Hearing Barron’s fluent piano and William's buoyant
bass lines make it only more appealing. Vitro returns with a liquid scat that impressively
dances over the melody and Riley’s trap work expertly keeps unassumingly impeccable
time.
Johnny Mandel’s
gorgeous “A Time for Love,” is a splendid display of just how well the trio and
Vitro can work such an emotive, show-like song. A song like this can be so
memorably expressed by artists that feel the music’s meaning and create the
right approach as a unit. This one is simply beautiful.
Dave
Frishberg’s “Listen Here” is a story-tellers piece that allows Vitro to shine and
making it her own with her gorgeous tone, flawless control, and her ability to
emote authentic feelings that cannot be faked. Barron’s piano is just masterful
and the two work the song with a simpatico that shines.
The balance
of the album includes Jobim’s “This Happy Madness,” a samba like song that includes
Hardy’s comping guitar and Vito’s airy vocal, Burke/Van Heusen’s uplifting “It Could
Happen to You,” with a wailing tenor solo by Cobb, and a bubbly trap solo by
Riley, “Easy Street” is humorously sung blues and features an elastic bass solo
by Williams, the musical theater-like “Sometime Ago,” and the cheeky
Rodgers/Hart “You Took Advantage of Me.”
This sparkling
album concludes with “Black Coffee,” a slow blues that Vitro sings with a
fearless abandon that just brims with espresso-like caffeine and overflows with
grit and sass. This last one is just the maraschino cherry on the top of this
Vitro sundae that she and the boys served up to us back
in 1982 and is gratefully back to thrill us again in 2020. If you love good
jazz, blues, and popular music sung by a superb vocalist then Roseanna Vitro’s Listen
Here will not disappoint.
