WEDNESDAYS
TRIVIA NIGHT & $1 DRAFTS
RUN THE GAP, 2nd & 4th Wed. of each Month
 

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14, 6 TO 8 PM
WINE TASTING EVENT
$39 advance ticket purchase, $45 at the door
Wine selections and menu to follow.

Pamela Luss, Performing August 7
with Houston Person

Sweet And Saxy (HighNote / Savant Records), the new album by the acclaimed young jazz singer Pamela Luss, is her first full-length collaboration with the legendary tenor saxophonist and producer Houston Person. The album has been acclaimed by both the general press and the music press alike, in publications ranging from The New York Times (who called it “a strong entry in the contemporary jazz-vocal catalog”) to Cabaret Scenes to Jazz Times, and featured on the cover of Jazz Inside NY.

Pamela and Houston celebrated the release of Sweet and Saxy with two sold-out performances at New York 's Jazz Standard. Lynn DiMenna wrote in Cabaret Scenes, “Great Concept, great vocals, great solos, and great evening!” She added that Pamela “at times sounds like a sexy saxophone herself.” Pamela also enjoyed highly successful in-store appearances at Barnes and Noble and J&R Music World; as a result of the latter performance, the new album wound up topping three of the retail giant's sales charts.

Sweet and Saxy has also been well received nationally and internationally, including in Japan.  "Everything about Pamela is first-rate, be it her solid chops, well-endowed voice, or skillful ballad delivery," as the Japanese magazine Jazz Yell raves, "The magical interaction between the warm sound of Person's tenor sax and Luss's expressive singing suggests the birth of a new, splendid partnership."     

Pamela Luss and Houston Person have actually been working together since 2007, and his famously beautiful saxophone tone has graced both of her two previous albums, Your Eyes and Magnet, which were both produced by industry veteran Todd Barkan.  As Joe Lang writes in Jersey Jazz, “They have developed a unique empathy that adds a special dimension to their partnership, as is in strong evidence on the current release.” Over the last three years, Pamela and Houston have performed together at clubs, including Dizzy's Club Coca Cola (at Jazz at Lincoln Center) and Feinstein's (at the Regency) in addition to The Jazz Standard.

 Sweet And Saxy is a glorious display of the dynamic synergy created by the emerging singer and the veteran horn man. Their special chemistry is described by Michael Nastos in All Music Guide. “Person works well with most singers (i.e. Etta Jones) but here he seems to feed off the vocal lines Luss dishes out. They’re clearly having fun trading phrases on occasion, or in retort when the vocalist makes statements like the come-and-runaway ballad ‘You Better Go Now,’ the light bossa nova take of ‘Can’t Get Out Of This Mood,’ or the sensual samba-tinged ‘You Belong To Me.’” Pamela, Houston, and pianist John di Martino created the arrangements together, and even the title Sweet And Saxy was jointly devised by Pamela and Houston.

The 12 songs included on the album are a testament to the remarkable energy of this great vocal-and-saxophone team, as well as to their diversity.  Together, they tackle everything from bouncy swingers (like "Nice n' Easy" and "Don'cha Go 'Way Mad") to beautiful ballads ("You Better Go Now" and "Maybe You'll Be There").  There are also rhythm and blues favorites, from classic ("Teardrops from My Eyes") to contemporary ("Ain't No Sunshine"), and great songwriters from Jerome Kern ("Why Was I Born") to Carol King ("It's Too Late") are also represented.

The two work so well together that Christopher Loudon of Jazz Times described Pamela and Houston as “An exalted partnership, meshing like the jeweled movement of a Patek Philippe,” and further describes Pamela’s voice as “intoxicating” and her performance as “bulls-eye accurate.”