Thisbe Vos: Under Your Spell

A Southern California Girl with a love of standards and romantic music, Thisbe Vos is not your typical female vocalist performing Louis Prima/ Keely Smith duets in a jazz band. Born in the Netherlands, Vos began exploring music by playing the harp and doing musical theatre and only after joining the British swing band, The Jive Aces, did she begin to embrace the style of love songs, ballads and swing that are the focus of her music. Her debut album Sophistication (CDBABY, 2011) featured an equal balance of standards and originals as does Under Your Spell demonstrating the singers talents as a songwriter. It's quite obvious by the selection of standards and the original compositions penned for this album that Vos, is enamored with the idea of romance and her lyrics, voice and music, are just the right magical mixture required for a spellbinding musical experience.

The sprite original "Shanghai Blues" gets the program going and features reed man Geoff Nudell accompanying Vos on a whistling clarinet solo. While the singer performs with a sharp septet, there are a few tracks where her ballad style love songs are backed up by The Pasadena String Ensemble and none as beautiful as the romantic title piece. The Theloneous Monk classic "Round Midnight" is another tune enjoying a string-laden musical atmosphere demonstrating the vocalist's affinity for ballads. The first of her well-chosen standards is "I Thought About You," a rendition that provides Vos with an opportunity to reach the high notes as well as highlighting musical director and pianist Gary Matsumoto .

There is an array of highlights here including "That's All Right With Me" where the singer's gorgeous vocal shares the stage with tenor saxophonist Carl Randall, "He's A Tramp" where the melody is catchy and the tempo light and breezy and the swinging, almost raunchy "Just A Fool Over You" where Nolan Shaheed's muted trumpet sets the mood. Irving Berlin's "Always" and Fats Waller's naughty "Ain't Misbehavin'" rounds out the program capping a fine vocal offering. Gifted with a silky voice and a knack for writing love songs, Thisbe Vos is an exciting vocalist who sprinkles a little dust of magic on Under Your Spell romancing her way into your heart and delivering an enchanting vocal performance.