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Margret: Com Voce
ByOn Com Você her voice shimmers through nine songs, expertly negotiated on the wave of a band that also reads her vocals with expert facility. But with miraculous empathy from guitarist Ben Monder and the ghostly percussive shadow of Luisito Quintero on some tracks, the musical world of this album revolves around Margret. Her voice glides, skips and dallies endlessly like air on glass. She infuses the lyric of each song with life, breathing into each word with sometimes short, shallow gasps and at other times with deep, interminably expanding lungs full of air that expel emotions like a myriad dandelions rising and falling on undulating thermals. Margret also picks the most precise note for the lyric, expanding, bending or clipping it short when the most nuanced part of the emotion demands it. As a result, she lands on its soft spot, extracting the most unusual feelings in response, from musicians and audience.
Com Você may be short on overall time, but it is a wonderful vehicle for Margret, with songs arranged by Gil Goldstein such as Rufus Wainwright's "Peach Trees" and Matt Pierson, who extracts an enviable chemistry between Ben Monder and the singer on Chris Issak's "Wicked Game." But perhaps the most memorable songs on the album could be Caetano Veloso's "Saudosismo," "O Trem Azul," from the pen of Lô Borges, and "By on Bye Tu (Farmer's Trust)" and "Half the Way (If I Could)," two tracks from Pat Metheny. There is really no chart here that falls short of wonderful. However, Margret's reading of the Brazilian music deserves special mention as she is not Brazilian and yet infuses the songs with emotion that only Brazilian singers with duende and a deeper sense of saudade can.
This could easily be a definitive vocal album from a singer who is blessed with just that magic that the word duende describes. Much more is sure to come from this truly gifted singer. How her fans, old and new alike, will be entranced will be a fabled experience.
Track Listing
É Preciso Dizer Adeus/All That's Left Is To Say Goodbye; Peach Trees; Saudosismo; Call Me; Wicked Game; By On Bye Tu (Farmer's Trust); O Trem Azul; É Preciso Dizer Adeus/All That's Left Is To Say Goodbye; Into Shade; Half The Way (If I Could)
Personnel
Margret Grebowicz: vocals; Stan Killian: tenor saxophone (2, 3, 6); Matvei Sigalov: acoustic guitar (1, 3, 3, 7, 8) violin (1); Ben Monder: electric guitar (4--6, 8, 9); Viviane Arnoux: accordion (4); Tim Collins: vibes (1,2, 6); Scott Colley: bass (1, 2, 4--6, 8); Antonio Sanchez: drums (1, 2, 4, 5, 8); Luisito Quintero: percussion (1--4, 6); Matt Pierson: producer.
Album information
Title: Com Voce | Year Released: 2010 | Record Label: Sunnyside Records
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