Jazz Articles about Tierney Sutton

Tierney Sutton: Not a Material Girl

by Carl L. Hager
September 8, 2009

Vocalist Tierney Sutton discovered jazz while immersed in Russian language and literature studies at Wesleyan University. During her college years she also abandoned her earlier atheism and became engaged in a lifelong study of Man's spiritual nature. She has adopted no halfway measures in any of these pursuits. Though she hasn't yet written lyrics, she brings the passion of a poet to the use of language and lyricism in her singing. Her religious devotion is Dostoevskian in its upright clarity ...

Tierney Sutton Band: Live at Iridium

by Ernest Barteldes
September 4, 2009

Tierney Sutton Band Iridium Jazz Club New York City August 21, 2009

Backed by her longtime band formed by Chris Jacob (piano), Kevin Axt (bass) and Ray Brinker (drums), vocalist Tierney Sutton took the stage at the famed New York City jazz club with a set mostly based on her album Desire (Telarc, 2009), a collection of standards that focus on songs about love--won, unrequited and lost.

The concert opened with “Heart's ...

Tierney Sutton Band: Desire

by Woodrow Wilkins
March 21, 2009

The soft flute that is Tierney Sutton's voice slowly brings the audience in to “It's Only a Paper Moon," the opening track to Desire, an 11-song collection of titles that expresses people's fixation on fame and fortune. The Grammy-nominated Tierney Sutton band defies mainstream practices; many vocalists often surround themselves with a seemingly constant rotation of talent, in contrast Sutton is accompanied by the same musicians: pianist Christian Jacobs, bassists Trey Henry and Kevin Axt, and drummer Ray ...

Tierney Sutton Band: Desire

by Joel Roberts
March 20, 2009

Most singers place the emphasis on romance when interpreting the Great American Songbook. Not Tierney Sutton. The LA-based vocalist's Desire is a decidedly unromantic, melancholy effort that looks at the darker side of standards by the likes of Cole Porter, Johnny Mercer and Harold Arlen, as well as more contemporary tunes by Dave Frishberg and others. With her clear, supple voice, sensuous delivery and an actress' flair for the dramatic, Sutton conveys skepticism along with heartbreak in ...

Tierney Sutton Band: Desire

by Jeff Winbush
March 17, 2009

On first hearing Desire, by vocalist Tierney Sutton, it's curious why the audience is so quiet, until realizing that it's not a live album, though it sounds like it should be. The underlying and unifying theme here is Sutton's goal to not only deliver the material from a spiritual perspective, but to include recited texts from The Hidden Words of Baha'ullah. Sutton has been a practicing Baha'i for over 25 years.What comes from these lofty ambitions is an ...

The Tierney Sutton Band: Desire

by C. Michael Bailey
March 9, 2009

Dark chocolate is a beautifully nefarious romantic ideal. Rather than possessing the youthful sweetness of milk chocolate, it instead offers a libertine bitterness, a taste that must be acquired to appreciate but once acquired, no other taste can sate. Having to learn to like something so that knowledge will bring added pleasure is an adult concept, perhaps a hedonistic one, that Paul obviously meant to express when he divinely penned to those salacious Corinthians,

“For now we see through a ...

Lorraine Feather: Language

by Nicholas F. Mondello
June 7, 2008

Lorraine Feather Language Jazzed Media 2008

By its very title, Language, from singer and lyricist Lorraine Feather, implies that Feather and company believe that they have the musical and linguistic chops to take on such a sophisticated concept for our entertainment. So it's good to find that Feather is a heavyweight who--with a championship caliber crew in her corner--delivers a resounding KO.

To some ears, story songs--word-intense tunes--may seem overly Broadwayesque and ...