Jazz Articles about Michael Feinstein

Michael Feinstein: Romance on Film, Romance on Broadway

by Dave Nathan
January 1, 2001

This is a double CD which comes from live sessions by Michael Feinstein at New York's Regency Hotel in April of 2000. The remaining tracks are studio sessions. All of it, as the album title advertises, is Feinstein's interpretations of standards from the Great American Songbook that were introduced or at least given notoriety on a Broadway stage or in a Hollywood film. It never ceases to amaze me how much Feinstein sounds like Johnny Mathis, communicating that intense, emotional ...

Michael Feinstein w/ Maynard Ferguson: Big City Rhythms

by Dave Hughes
April 1, 2000

Up to this point, Michael Feinstein has focused his talents on Broadway and Tin Pan Alley tunes. This is his first foray into big band swing, and it's a rewarding and satisfying effort.  Feinstein exhibits expressiveness, precision, and an excellent command of dynamics.  Maynard Ferguson is primarily in a supporting role here, fronting a full big band comprised of his current Big Bop Nouveau personnel, some alumni, and some L.A. big band pros. He does get a few solo spots, ...

Michael Feinstein with the Maynard Ferguson Big Band: Big City Rhythms

by Jack Bowers
January 1, 2000

Big City Rhythms represents something of a departure for singer / composer / arranger Michael Feinstein. Instead of centering his performance on the works of a single popular composer, as he usually does, Feinstein takes a large bite out of the Great American Songbook; and instead of performing with a small group or generic big band, he enlists the services of trumpeter Maynard Ferguson whose ensemble is hardly an unknown quantity. The upshot is a marvelous album that offers the ...

Michael Feinstein: Big City Rhythms

by Jim Santella
December 1, 1999

What do Michael Feinstein and Maynard Ferguson have in common? They’re both prolific (Feinstein has 18 albums now). Both have an appreciation for popular songs and both employ distinctive sounds. Feinstein’s vocal quality is smooth, shallow and friendly, while Ferguson’s thin, high-pitched trumpet acrobatics are legendary. Neither artist makes full use of music overtones, preferring instead to do without a full, rich, resonant tone. Both have the initials M.F. But that’s where the similarities end.

Feinstein’s strength lies in his ...

Michael Feinstein: Michael & George: Feinstein Sings Gershwin

by Jack Bowers
October 1, 1998

By now, most people who have some knowledge of popular music (the “standards,” that is, not what passes today for popular), know also that Michael Feinstein is, as the sleeve note to Michael & George asserts, “widely recognized as one of the foremost experts [on] and interpreters of [George] Gershwin’s music. ....” On Michael & George those interpretations are, as always, flawless. Michael knows George well, and knows how to describe his compositions and their lyrics (most of them written ...

Michael Feinstein: Michael & George: Feinstein Sings Gershwin

by Jim Santella
October 1, 1998

In person, Michael Feinstein approaches his audience with a shy, polite, unassuming manner. He accompanies himself at the piano and adds interesting interludes to complement his delivery of a lyric. Between numbers his rapport reveals a genuine love for the American popular song; particularly the volumes by Irving Berlin, Harry Warren, and George Gershwin. At the age of 21, Feinstein accepted employment working for Ira Gershwin as a copyist and researcher, and that has led to a career sharing the ...