PATRICIA BARBER - Split (1989-2004) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Pianist/vocalist Patricia Barber's recording debut, Split, is a fairly straight-ahead affair featuring the idiosyncratic stylist on various standards and originals. Showcasing her unique approach to jazz, the album finds Barber mixing pointed and minimalist lines à la Chet Baker with a dramatic cabaret vocal style and complex harmonic post-bop passages -- a template that longtime fans will recognize. To these ends, Barber opens with a brisk Latin version of "Early Autumn," takes a dusky vocal turn on "Easy to Love," and shows her cerebral side on such originals as "Winter Illusion." Joining Barber here are bassist Michael Arnopol and drummer Mark Walker. by Matt Collar
Tracklist :
1     Early Autumn 4:26
Ralph Burns / Woody Herman / Johnny Mercer
2     Greys 5:33
Patricia Barber
3     Alone Together 4:31
Howard Dietz / Arthur Schwartz
4     Spy Sly 4:27
Patricia Barber
5     Easy to Love 4:33
Cole Porter
6     Too Late Now 4:48
Burton Lane / Alan Jay Lerner
7     Winter Illusion 5:24
Patricia Barber
8     Retrograde 3:20
Patricia Barber
9     Two for the Road 4:41
Leslie Bricusse / Henry Mancini
10     Then I'll Be Tired of You 5:10
E.Y. "Yip" Harburg / Arthur Schwartz
Credts :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums – Mark Walker
Piano, Vocals – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - A Distortion of Love (1992-2012) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Pianist and singer Patricia Barber's second album (and major-label debut) is a consistently interesting, but not always completely rewarding, array of original instrumentals, vocal standards, and surprise cover versions. The arrangement of "Summertime" that opens the program is eerie almost to the point of creepiness, and all the more effective for it: after a long instrumental prelude, Barber sings the lyrics over the most minimal bass-and-piano unison pedal point, her voice goosed with reverb and wailing softly like a ghost. "Subway Station #5," the original composition that follows, is nervous, jumpy, barely tonal, and moves niftily from a contrapuntal and polyrhythmic introduction into a straight swing section. The problem is that it lasts almost ten minutes, and by the seventh or eighth minute, its ideas seem pretty well played out. "Or Not to Be" and "Yet Another in a Long Series of Yellow Cars" suffer from similar treatment. But her singing on "You Stepped Out of a Dream" and, especially, her sweet and touching rendition of the soul classic "My Girl" are quietly spectacular. There's every reason to expect great things of her in the future. by Rick Anderson  
Tracklist :
1     Summertime 6:15
George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin / DuBose Heyward
2     Subway Station #5 9:31
Patricia Barber
3     You Stepped Out of a Dream 7:36
Nacio Herb Brown / Gus Kahn
4     Parts Parallels 5:06
Patricia Barber
5     Or Not to Be 7:04
Patricia Barber
6     Yellow Car 5:50
Patricia Barber / Patricia Barer
7     Yet Another in a Long Series of Yellow Car 4:28
Patricia Barber / Patricia Barer
8     I Never Went Away 4:38
Richard Rodney Bennett
9     My Girl 3:44
Smokey Robinson / Ronald White
10     Be Myself 4:54
Howard Dietz / Arthur Schwartz
Credits :
Bass – Marc Johnson
Drums, Shaker, Percussion [Cheap Shoes], Finger Snaps – Adam Nussbaum
Guitar – Wolfgang Muthspiel
Vocals, Piano – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - Cafe Blue (1994) SACD / FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Patricia Barber, who is both a fine keyboardist and an atmospheric singer, contributes roughly half of the material to her Premonition debut. Her dark voice and the generally esoteric program takes awhile to get used to (listeners will have to be patient), but after two or three listens, this thought-provoking and rather moody set becomes more accessible. The music ranges stylewise from sophisticated pop sensitivities to the avant-garde and even touches of minimalism, while not fitting securely into any category. Barber gives a new slant to "The Thrill Is Gone," "Ode to Billy Joe," and even "A Taste of Honey," and her vocals are all quite haunting and contemporary. An added plus to this unusual music is adventurous guitarist John McLean. by Scott Yanow
Tracklist :
1     What a Shame 5:24
Patricia Barber
2     Mourning Grace 6:57
Patricia Barber
3     The Thrill Is Gone 4:39
Lew Brown / Ray Henderson
4     Romanesque 4:34
Patricia Barber
5     Yellow Car III 5:08
Patricia Barber
6     Wood Is a Pleasant Thing to Think About 1:00
Patricia Barber
7     Inch Worm 5:10
Frank Loesser
8     Ode to Billy Joe 5:22
Bobbie Gentry
9     Too Rich for My Blood 8:08
Patricia Barber
10     A Taste of Honey 4:31
Ric Marlow / Bobby Scott
11     Nardis 9:01
Miles Davis
12     Manha de Carnaval 3:23
Luiz Bonfá / Antônio Carlos Jobim
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums, Percussion, Percussion [Body Parts] – Mark Walker
Guitar – John McLean
Piano, Vocals, Producer – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - Modern Cool (1998) SACD / FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

The dark, smoky voice of Patricia Barber is quite haunting. On Modern Cool, she mostly sings downbeat songs at slow tempos. All but three songs are her own originals, and they deal with such subject matter as a "homage to beauty" that seems to connect painting one's face with prostitution, loneliness, mindless conformity, the "postmodern blues" and other depressing topics. Even her treatments of "You and the Night and the Music" and "Light My Fire" make one think that she is utterly bored with life. Barber, whose piano playing is mostly very much in the background, comes across on this set as a pop/folk singer. Most of the jazz moments are provided by trumpeter Dave Douglas, who is on half of the selections and adds some much-needed excitement; guitarist John McLean, bassist Michael Arnopol, and drummer/percussionist Mark Walker complete the group. This set is definitely for specialized tastes. by Scott Yanow
Tracklist :
 1     Touch of Trash 5:27
Patricia Barber
2     Winter 4:52
Patricia Barber
3     You and the Night and the Music 8:03
Howard Dietz / Arthur Schwartz
4     Constantinople 8:26
Patricia Barber
5     Light My Fire 5:16
John Densmore / Robby Krieger / Ray Manzarek / Jim Morrison
6     Silent Partner 5:08
Patricia Barber
7     Company 5:42
Patricia Barber
8     Let It Rain 5:55
Patricia Barber
9     She's a Lady 4:15
Paul Anka
10     Love, Put on Your Faces 5:46
Patricia Barber
11     Postmodern Blues 5:48
Patricia Barber
12     Let It Rain - Vamp 3:03
Patricia Barber
13    If This Isn't Jazz 5:14
Patricia Barber
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Choir – Choral Thunder Vocal Choir
Drums, Percussion – Mark Walker
Guitar – John McLean
Producer, Piano, Vocals, Effects – Patricia Barber
Trumpet – Dave Douglas
Udu – Jeff Stitely

PATRICIA BARBER - Companion (1999) SACD / FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Companion was recorded in a special three-night series of shows in July, 1999 at Chicago's famed Green Mill jazz club -- an unusually short amount of time to produce a live album. To mine as much material as possible from those nights the performances were run more like recording sessions than live shows, with the crowd reverently hushed. Patricia Barber is in her element and the only thing that seems to have suffered for the recording circumstances is the album's length -- at seven songs and 40 minutes, it walks the line between standard EP and full-length size. One surmises that it might have been longer had there been more album-quality material from the performances. Recalling the energy that was present on her critically worshipped Café Blue album, there is an ease and creativity on Companion which makes her fans' devotion understandable. Barber has been criticized for being a jazz singer in the loosest sense -- her style borrows heavily from R&B and she often covers pop songs (Sonny Bono's "The Beat Goes On" is a sheer stylish delight), and her song "If This Isn't Jazz" answers that criticism with a thumb to the nose. What many critics fail to notice, however, is the strength of her musicianship. Sexism within the industry keeps many from seeing female jazz performers playing roles other than those of vocalists -- Barber's warm, breathy voice and creative phrasing are wonderful, for sure, but what really shines are her arrangements. With a talented band behind her, on Companion Barber has made magic with her compositions, her piano playing, and yes, her voice. Intended to be a companion to Modern Cool, this album of mostly previously unrecorded material serves as an excellent introduction to all of her work. by Stacia Proefrock  
Tracklist :
1     The Beat Goes On 5:27
Sonny Bono
2     Use Me 6:32
Bill Withers
3     Like JT 8:18
Patricia Barber
4     Let It Rain 5:09
Patricia Barber
5     Touch of Trash 4:48
Patricia Barber
6     If This Isn't Jazz 5:13
Patricia Barber
7     Black Magic Woman 10:32
Peter Green
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums, Percussion – Eric Montzka
Guitar – John McLean
Percussion – Ruben P. Alvarez
Piano, Vocals, Organ [Hammond], Producer – Patricia Barber

 

PATRICIA BARBER - Nightclub (2000) SACD / FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Chicago native and classically trained pianist Patricia Barber's sixth album is a collection of downtempo standards, perfect for a rainy day. Taking on classics like "Autumn Leaves," "I Fall in Love Too Easily," "Bye Bye Blackbird," or even "Alfie" is always a risk, but her confident vocals and interpretations eradicate any doubt that she is a master. Her production is spare, allowing her to sing with such melancholy it's almost eerie. Not many performers can relay such harrowing feeling without over-emoting, but Barber makes it seem effortless. Nightclub is an appropriate title; listening to these love songs is like being in a smoky room, courted by a lounge singer. This is a classy, solid effort. by Bryan Buss
Tracklist :
1     Bye Bye Blackbird 4:03
Mort Dixon / Ray Henderson
2     Invitation 4:58
Bronislaw Kaper / Paul Francis Webster    
3     Yesterdays 6:40
Otto Harbach / Jerome Kern
4     Just for a Thrill 3:20
Lil Armstrong / Don Raye    
5     You Don't Know Me 3:46
Eddy Arnold / Cindy Walker     
6     Alfie 4:50
Burt Bacharach / Hal David    
7     Autumn Leaves 5:04
Joseph Kosma / Johnny Mercer / Jacques Prévert    
8     Summer Samba (Samba de Verão) 3:44
Norman Gimbel / Marcos Valle / Paulo Sérgio Valle        
9     All or Nothing at All 3:25
Arthur Altman / Jack Lawrence
10     So in Love 3:42
Cole Porter
11     A Man & A Woman 4:19
Pierre Barouh / Jerry Keller / Francis Lai
12     I Fall in Love Too Easily 3:29
Sammy Cahn / Jule Styne
Credits :
Bass – Marc Johnson (pistas: 1 to 3, 7, 8), Michael Arnopol (pistas: 5, 9, 10)
Drums – Adam Cruz (pistas: 4 to 6, 9 to 11.), Adam Nussbaum (pistas: 1 to 3, 7, 8)
Grand Piano [Steinway], Vocals – Patricia Barber
Guitar [8-string] – Charlie Hunter (pistas: 4, 6, 11)

PATRICIA BARBER - Verse (2002) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Pianist/vocalist Patricia Barber is the Alanis Morissette of the jazz world. Her serpentine, poetic songs teeter between deftly witty and awkwardly Latinate. Each album is more ambitious than the last, taking her deeper into avant-garde territory both lyrically and instrumentally. Verse is no exception. Case in point: "I Could Eat Your Words," a canny bit of word play in the tradition of "Peel Me a Grape," in which Barber barely gets away with words like "provocation" and "syllogistically," only to sum things up with the devastating line, "sip the spit from your bittersweet rhyme." The indelible track here, though, has to be "If I Were Blue," featuring the line, "If I were blue, like David Hockney's pool/Dive into me and glide under a California sky/Inside your mouth and nose and eyes am I." It's perhaps the best thing Barber has ever written -- it could be considered serious modern poetry if only it didn't rhyme. About the biggest complaint one can lodge against Barber is her insistent denial of melody. Her voice is soft, almost matter-of-fact, and she more or less hints at singing. Obviously, lyrical intent is more important to Barber than how she carries a tune, and her voice does seem more suited to whispering torch songs cabaret-style, such as on "Dansons la Gigue," than delivering any vocal gymnastics. It's just that sometimes her songs could be showcased better with a consistently delivered vocal melody. However, she makes up for her lack of sonorousness (to use a Barber kind of word) with intricate musical arrangements, this time around augmented by the Miles Davis-cum-Lester Bowie trumpet of Dave Douglas. Barber's is a world of cloaked intentions, and Douglas' playful vibrato works like the flame of a candle illuminating her soft, shadowy corners. by Matt Collar  
Tracklist :
1    The Moon    6:02
 Patricia Barber
2    Lost In This Love    3:01
 Patricia Barber
3    Clues 4:57
Conductor [Strings], Arranged By [Strings] – Cliff Colnot
Strings – Baird Dodge, Fox Fehling, Judy Stone, Karen Dirks, Katinka Kleijn, Lawrence Brown, Lawrence Neuman, Lee Lane, Lei Hou, Marlou Johnston, Paul Phillips, Qing Hou, Robert Swan, Ronald Satkiewicz
4    Pieces    5:33
 Patricia Barber
5    I Could Eat Your Words    7:49
 Patricia Barber
6    The Fire    4:49
 Patricia Barber
7    Regular Pleasures    5:40
 Patricia Barber
8    Dansons La Gigue 4:18
Lyrics By [Adapted From A Text By] – Paul Verlaine
9    You Gotta Go Home    3:16
 Patricia Barber
10    If I Were Blue    6:00
 Patricia Barber
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums – Eric Montzka (pistas: 9), Joey Baron (pistas: 1 to 8)
Guitar – Neal Alger
Piano [Steinway Grand], Electric Piano [Fender Rhodes], Vocals, Lyrics By [Words], Music By, Producer – Patricia Barber
Trumpet – Dave Douglas

PATRICIA BARBER - Live : A Fortnight in France (2004) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Tracklist :
1    Gotcha 6:14
Written-By – Barber
2    Dansons La Gigue! 5:13
Written-By – Barber
3    Crash 7:28
Written-By – Barber
4    Laura 5:27
Written-By – Raskin, Mercer
5    Pieces 6:47
Written-By – Barber
6    Blue Prelude 5:54
Written-By – Jenkins, Bishop
7    Witchcraft 6:28
Written-By – Leigh, Coleman
8    Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) 7:10
Written-By – Lennon-McCartney
9    Whiteworld 6:08
Written-By – Barber
10    Call Me 6:37
Lyrics By – Gasso
Music By – Fields
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums – Eric Montzka
Guitar – Neal Alger
Piano, Vocals, Producer – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - The Cole Porter Mix (2008) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Jazz songwriter and pianist Patricia Barber's 2006 album Mythologies, a song cycle based on Ovid's Metamorphosis, is a sprawling work of poetic and musical adventure. Upon its release, it garnered universal acclaim from critics and responsive concert audiences across the United States and Europe. After this rigorous undertaking, Barber could have been forgiven for taking a breather. And on its surface, that seems to be what the Cole Porter Mix is. But in Barber's case, this is far from true. While she claims in her bio that she's been singing his songs for years, and that he's her favorite songwriter, she does anything but a "standard" read on his tunes, though she never undermines their integrity. The album is called a "mix" because Barber has woven three of her own tunes -- written after the manner of Porter's -- into the fabric of the album. Given her austere yet highly original readings of his songs, they fit in seamlessly. She is accompanied here by her longtime backing group of Neal Alger (guitar), Michael Arnopol (bass), and Eric Montzka (drums), with drummer Nate Smith alternating on three tunes, and guest saxophonist Chris Potter appearing on five.

Commencing with the opening number "Easy to Love," with its skeletal bossa nova rhythm (Barber doesn't play in the body of the tune and only contributes a wonderfully economical piano solo), and the relative austerity of her voice, it's obvious this isn't an ordinary standards set. She is faithful to the intent of these songs both lyrically and musically, but she shifts their arrangements in such a way that they are more suited to her deliberately restrained singing voice, and her own vocation as a songwriter. It's the songwriter she is paying tribute to here -- not the tradition. "I Concentrate on You" also carries within it the kernel of bossa, but this time, with her piano fills and artfully incisive manner of accenting, to quote Porter, "how strange the change from major to minor" without invoking the blues (the standard for doing so). Barber's pianism is elegantly idiosyncratic, even enigmatic. Her "cool" singing voice peels away the weight these songs have borne over the years, and instead returns to them their subtlety and gentle sense of humorous irony. There are some wild moments here -- such as the Latin polyrhythms at the heart of "In the Still of the Night," that set up a space for some serious blowing tenor by Potter -- but the spirit of "song" is never compromised. Barber's originals are truly canny, empathic evidence of her true understanding of Porter. "Snow," with its minor-key piano intro opens with: "Do you think of me like snow/cool, slippery and white? Do you think of me like jazz/as hip, as black as night?" The mysterious, dull ache of love and lust in "New Year's Eve Song" evokes the forlorn aspect of Porter but the strange, covert voyeurism of poet Robert Lowell's "Eep Hour": "Will he/peek in the mirror while she/knowing he's watching her tease/stripping the gown with ease/bare as the New Year, she/so in love with her is he..." All the while, the sense of a taut harmonic melody is inseparable from the lyrics, unveiling the secret intent in the song for both listener and singer. The Cole Porter Mix is a very modern form of imitation, as evidenced not only by interpretation but in her evocative compositions too; they mark the greatest form of flattery. But it is also an ingenious manner of reconsidering Porter -- and Barber -- with fresh ears. by Thom Jurek  
Tracklist :
1     Easy to Love 3:36
Cole Porter
2     I Wait for Late Afternoon and You 5:14
Patricia Barber
3     I Get a Kick out of You 4:28
Cole Porter
4     You're the Top 3:39
Cole Porter
5     Just One of Those Things 3:47
Cole Porter
6     Snow 4:45
Patricia Barber
7     C'est Magnifique 3:37
Cole Porter
8     Get out of Town 4:22
Cole Porter
9     I Concentrate on You 5:02
Cole Porter
10     In the Still of the Night 5:24
Cole Porter
11     What Is This Thing Called Love? 3:59
Cole Porter
12     Miss Otis Regrets 4:10
Cole Porter
13     The New Year's Eve Song 4:01
Patricia Barber
Credits :
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Drums, Percussion – Eric Montzka (pistas: 2 to 10,13), Nate Smith (pistas: 1,11,12)
Guitar – Neal Alger
Producer [Assistant] – Grażyna Auguścik
Saxophone – Chris Potter (pistas: 3,5,7,10,13)
Vocals, Piano, Melodica, Producer – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - Smash (2013) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Patricia Barber is a crack jazz pianist, an innovative composer, a singular vocal stylist, and among the most original lyricists/song-poets to come down the pipe in 40 years. Her use of metaphor and metonymy is woven inextricably into her trademark melodies, which create mental and sonic images that evoke insight and emotion. Smash, Barber's debut for Concord, is comprised of original material performed by an excellent band that includes guitarist John Kregor, bassist Larry Kohut, and drummer Jon Deitemyer. The predominant subject matter of these songs is love's loss: the frustrated desire, grief, acceptance, longing, and healing its aftermath brings. Barber is as empathic and insightful as a depth psychologist. Her language is rich, precise, and devoid of trite sentimentality. Lyrically, these songs are wound with the elastic imagery of poetry, but their rhyme schemes are taut, given air by the fluidity of her jazz. Opener "Code Cool" is introduced by Deitemyer's snare and hi-hat in a constant thrum that emulates the pulse of electronic dance music. It's underscored by a one-note vamp from Kohut. Barber's piano illustrates with a series of glissando chords as Kregor fills the space expressionistically, highlighting the well of images and urgency in lyrics which reference science, Keats, and medical treatment before concluding she is "...Michaelangelo's David/Tested and worn..." Barber employs space between sections, stilling the proceeding with a single chord, before that pulse returns to her protagonist's realization that she needs to fake it until she makes it: "I will live/As if/I were loving." "The Wind Song" is a brooding, mysterious ballad, whose lyric drama is spacious, highlighted by brushed symbols, acoustic guitar, nearly gossamer pianism, and a physical bassline to bind it to earth. In the title track's first half, the piano and bass offer the tender illustration of "the sound of a heart breaking..." But at the halfway point, the physical fury of that emotion is laid bare by Kregor's screaming electric guitar solo, which allows for the held, breathless emotional power in this and all the previous songs, release. The companion piece is "Scream," where a jazz piano ballad opens into a nearly full-blown rocker. "Redshift" is a crystalline bossa nova; its lyrics unite love's loss with physics in clever, hip associations punctuated by a syncopated groove. "Bashful" is a swinging post-bop instrumental that features great soloing by everyone. "Missing" is introduced by Kregor's acoustic and Barber's sparse piano. It's a musically metaphorical illustration of the tune's subject matter: waiting in vain, hoping against hope that the truth of loss isn't, in fact, true. It's raw, vulnerable, and fearful. Kregor's gorgeous solo and Kohut's economical bassline offer room for Barber's piano to illuminate the lyric with tenderness. Smash is an extraordinary achievement. Here, jazz is popular music without being anything other than itself. Its depth, creativity, searing poetry, and artisan musicianship make it a peerless accomplishment. by Thom Jurek  
Tracklist :
1    Code Cool    5:20
 Patricia Barber
2    The Wind Song    3:39
 Patricia Barber
3    Romanesque    2:20
 Patricia Barber
4    Smash    4:20
 Patricia Barber
5    Redshift    4:25
 Patricia Barber
6    Spring Song    4:38
 Patricia Barber
7    Devil's Food    5:07
 Patricia Barber
8    Scream    5:43
 Patricia Barber
9    The Swim    4:23
 Patricia Barber
10    Bashful    6:09
 Patricia Barber
11    The Storyteller    3:12
 Patricia Barber
12    Missing    5:20
 Patricia Barber
Credits :
Bass – Larry Kohut
Drums – Jon Deitemyer
Guitar – John Kregor
Piano, Producer [Produced By], Vocals – Patricia Barber

PATRICIA BARBER - Higher (2019) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Tracklist :
Angels, Birds, And I ...
Written-By – Patricia Barber
1    Muse    5:42
2    Surrender    5:44
3    Pallid Angel    3:49
4    The Opera Song    4:30
5    High Summer Season    3:35
6    The Albatross Song    5:25
7    Voyager    4:19
8    Higher    3:33
9    Early Autumn 5:36
Music By – Woody Herman
Words By – Johnny Mercer, Ralph Burns
10    In Your Own Sweet Way 6:10
Music By – Dave Brubeck
11    Secret Love 2:42
Music By – Sammy Fain
Words By – Paul Francis Webster
12    The Opera Song 5:27
Featuring [With] – Katherine Werbiansky
Written-By – Patricia Barber
Credits :
Acoustic Guitar – Neal Alger
Bass – Patrick Mulcahy
Drums – Jon Deitemyer
Piano, Voice – Patricia Barber
Soprano Vocals [Lyric Soprano] – Katherine Werbiansky
Tenor Saxophone – Jim Gailloreto

PATRICIA BARBER - Mythologies (2006) APE (image+.cue), lossless

Is it still art when you can fingerpop to it? Finally, it's arrived. In 2003 jazz songwriter, pianist, and bandleader Patricia Barber received a Guggenheim fellowship to create a song cycle based on Ovid's Metamorphoses. Barber is that rare kind of jazz artist -- she appeals to non-jazz fans. She's as ambitious as they get and her poetic, sometimes brainy compositions sit well with sophisticated pop audiences everywhere. On Mythologies, Barber has taken the heart of Ovid's text (he was a Roman poet doing his own intertextual take on Greek mythology) and created 11 pieces, each based on one character in his cycle. She's in turn written a different piece -- in style, linguistic content, and feel -- for each character she was drawn to. Much like the poet, philosopher, and playwright Anne Carson, Barber uses the present vernacular to recontextualize these seemingly eternal characters in the bedrock of jazz and her own brand of sophisticated and literary pop; she places Ovid's poems where they belong -- in song. Barber is accompanied by her crack band -- guitarist Neal Alger, bassist Michael Arnopol, and drummer Eric Montzka -- and employs as many guests as it takes to get her songs across. This isn't the gutting of ancient high culture; it's the presentation of it as something instructive, personal, and revelatory in the inner life of the songwriter. Musically, beginning with the spacious yet knotty piano notes that usher in "The Moon," Barber takes Ovid's characters, sets their context in the present vernacular (mostly), and allows them to manifest the faces of those we know, have known, or have been: "With whitecake/On my face/The actress backstage/Contemplates/Laying a universal egg/Still a broken heart/Is a broken heart...." The stillness of the moon witnesses all, and we enact our life scenarios under it, whether true or false. Alger underscores the vocal lines with small single-line runs and effects, as does the near constant bass of Arnopol. When the skittering hip-hop drums kick in after the verse ends, the band takes off, cracks the groove open (Barber's lower-register notes usher in the blues and then arpeggiates out of them), and works it.

The elegant sensuality of "Morpheus" is a dreamy tune for the king of dreams, who suffers from and witnesses ever-unrequited love -- because everyone has. The single-note bass pulse of Arnopol is hypnotic as it underscores Jim Gailloreto's soloing. The melody is dressed for the evening by Barber's gorgeous chord voicings. But it is in "Pygmalion" and "Hunger" that Ovid's truth becomes plain. Mythologies is about want and its many, many faces, about passage and arrival and return. Alger's guitar is beautifully twinned with Barber's voice as she sings "....Wildly attractive and seductive as sin/The closer you come.../The more you want to be free.../When the gods get even/They think of me/While you're fast asleep in your bed as I flee/As...I give you a kiss/As I take my leave/I leave you with this.../That there's never enough to eat...." Alger's guitar kicks it up a notch and is propelled by cowbells, rim shots, and cymbals, countered by the bass which creates the swirl of dream and desire out of silence and harmony. In fact, both "Pygmalion" and "Hunger" are sick with desire; they reflect our own sickness with it. It's all craving: "Like Narcissus and his lover/You can never have the other/You can never lick the plate/Clean...." "Icarus," written for Nina Simone, is ushered by strummed, rubbery, yes, perhaps even melting guitar chords and a slippery, fluid bassline as Simone's tale -- as interpreted through Ovid's Icarus via Barber -- is revealed in the subjective moment. It's nocturnal, dreamy, picaresque, and full of swirl and swoop, with a memorable melody. The dark, minor-chord voicings that usher in "Orpheus" offer the blues as isolation, as the interlocutor of emptiness. The sensuality is in the void, but it remains smoldering with want in the flesh and with hope in the heart. The tender "Persephone," with its lushness and the languid ease of its night lounge wishes, gives voice to the following "Narcissus," together these are among the most beautiful songs Barber has ever written. She finds the Roman, the Greek, and the Anglo tenets, the secret faces of her characters, and sets them in the looking glass viewing themselves and/as one another. Yet all of them in song are communicated from an airy shelter of reverie. Jazz falls down around each one, with a pop caress. They are not statues, but instead have the ever-thinning appearance of the lost, the forgotten, the wished for, the never possessed.

The hard truth of all -- as Ovid saw in his own looking glass -- lies in Barber's lines: "Brazenly object/Willingly subject...." "Whiteworld/Oedipus" funks, rocks, swerves, and spills over the lip of the cup to reveal thievery and non-subjective will as their own gift and reward: "I have institutions in the West/To make institutions in the East/I historically revise/With deconstructionist ease...I'm a gangster in a Hummer/And this culture will yield to me/Whiteworld...." "Phaeton," fleshed out by a hip-hop choir, displays the cycle in its most questioning face. Barber's band plays emotively and lushly before the rapping voices fall down like a sequence of apocalyptic environmental prophecies that are coming true in the present. They reveal the coming darkness in the spatial moment when the bill comes due, as the band attempts to comfort these prophets in their anguish. The set ends with "The Hours," where loss, regret, passage, and transformation -- indeed metamorphosis -- all come out of the closet, rolling down with desperate bargains and false hopes in their open hands. Barber nearly whispers her character's preparation in balladry so impure and unsentimental that its sensuality is raw but iconoclastically beautiful. The band enters seamlessly, and fills out the passage of night as the sun asserts its rise to a rock & roll backbeat. The group rises, too; the tempo becomes more pronounced and the choir is heard once more, nearly gospel-like -- except for the syncopation in its utterances -- as it follows Barber toward the emptying out of this ragged but sultry vessel.

Here is where those left off and left over beg for Heaven to wait one more day before it claims them, even as it arrives with its wry smile and bared teeth. The simple melodic structure belies the sheer want and need of the hopeless request. When the refrain "Who'll save us now?" comes reverberating back from the choir with a vengeance, one realizes that there really is no vengeance, only recurrence as the dream begins anew. Mythologies is a single moment in jazz when the entire music moves forward because it engages the culture as it is. Blues and swing are embedded in these complex, ever-shifting harmonics and melodic songs; they shape-shift through pop, balladry, rock, post-bop, and even hip-hop. They stand on their own in the full poetic view of the written and sung word. Indeed, as a whole they become something wonderfully new, generated from the meat, bone, and sinew of the past as it enters the here and now. Mythologies is Barber's masterpiece -- thus far. by Thom Jurek  
Tracklist:
1 The Moon 7:10
Patricia Barber
2 Morpheus 4:34
Patricia Barber
3 Pygmalion 4:40
Patricia Barber
4 Hunger 4:35
Patricia Barber
5 Icarus (For Nina Simone) 5:14
Patricia Barber
6 Orpheus / Sonnet 4:33
Patricia Barber
7 Persephone 6:00
Patricia Barber
Vocals [Additional] – Lawrice Flowers, Paul Falk
8 Narcissus 3:41
Patricia Barber
9 Whiteworld / Oedipus 5:21
Patricia Barber
10 Phaeton 5:21
Patricia Barber
Vocals [Additional] – Airreal Watkins, Lawrice Flowers, Walter “Mitchell” Owens, III
11 The Hours 7:47
Patricia Barber
Vocals [Additional] – Grazyna Auguscik
Credits:
Backing Vocals, Chorus Master – Shelby Webb, Jr. (tracks: 10, 11)
Bass – Michael Arnopol
Choir – Choral Thunder (tracks: 10, 11)
Drums – Eric Montzka
Guitar – Neal Alger
Piano, Vocals, Written-By, Producer – Patricia Barber
Saxophone – Jim Gailloreto (tracks: 1, 2, 10)