Natalie Douglas at Birdland

Natalie Douglas
Birdland
New York, NY
October 27, 2025

Songstress Natalie Douglas, bedecked in a shimmering gold outfit, presented her popular tribute to the seventies on a lovely autumn night at Birdland in the heart of the Broadway theater district. Her favorite decade—the years between 1971 and 1980—offered up a rich motherlode of material for Douglas, who bounced around between funk and soul, pop and movie themes to present a full-throated paean to this golden era of popular music.

Backed by Mark Hartman on the Birdland Yamaha C7, Alec Berlin on guitar, Jakubu Griffins on drums and Sherisse Rogers on bass, Douglas kicked off the proceedings with a mash-up of two disparate hall of fame tunesmiths: Anthony Newley and Stevie Wonder. "Gonna Build a Mountain," from Newley's sophomore Broadway show The Roar of the Greasepaint, the Smell of the Crowd (it played the Shubert Theater, a block east of Birdland on 44th) may forever be associated with Sammy Davis Jr., but Douglas gave it a funkier groove, thanks to Rogers' fervent bass line, a beat that made the transition to Stevie's "Higher Ground" an easy stretch. Linda Ronstadt's plaintive "Long, Long Time" found Berlin switching to acoustic guitar to get that Laurel Canyon sound, Hartman embellishing the performance with Conway Twitty-esque keyboard flourishes.

Douglas cautioned that the next tune was "not the theme song you expected" before seguing into the James Bond hit "Diamonds are Forever," giving the song a brassy Shirley Bassey-style reading. Another big jump (yet still in the '70s) found her covering the Eagles "Lyin Eyes," a song she got to know when, early in their career, that hitmaking machine played her LA elementary school, where she was "the only little brown girl in the first two rows," she explained with glee. The song became a Birdland singalong, guided effortlessly by the headliner.

"The best of the '70s murder ballads" brought the set list back around to "The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia," with Hartman providing a nice harmony on the refrain and Berlin taking a few tasty licks. "Mr Bojangles" was its usual poignant precis; Douglas dedicated her soulful rendition to the thousands of Black performers who had to make art in America in Mr B's early, difficult days.

Rupert Holmes' "Queen Bee," a feminist ode from the guy who wrote the Pina Colada Song, and the Paul Williams/Roger Nichols hit for the Carpenters "Rainy Days & Mondays" hit the spot, with Berlin limning a nice guitar break in the later. To a solo piano accompaniment, Douglas sang Janis Ian's smoky "At Seventeen," followed by a big, rocking version of the Elton John—Bernie Taupin anthem "Someone Saved My Life Tonight."

To close out the evening, Douglas returned to politics, covering Marvin Gaye's great "What's Going On" and Donny Hathaway's "Tryin' Times," Hartman pounding away on the 88s to drive home her point. There were lots of songs in the '70s—by her count, Douglas started with 170 before narrowing the program to these thirteen gems. Effortlessly weaving back and forth between styles and subjects, she brought them all back, making a most entertaining night of the decade.

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