Maude Maggart Sings Irving Berlin

I have to preface this by saying I am not an Irving Berlin fan. I grew up listening to Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and The Police. Iriving Berlin was the type of stuff my dad listened to. Ick!

I first heard Maude Maggart when she was interviewed on NPR. When they started the interview, I planned to be underwhelmed. A singer doing a caberet show? What have they been smoking? But then I heard her sing... WOW.

The sample I heard was from "Always," one of the many famous songs by Berlin. It was absolutely amazing. Her range and perfect pitch are fully demonstrated in this piece. I was eager to hear more.

At this time, a few years ago, Amazon didn't carry Maggart's recordings, so I had to do a lot of searching to find a place that did. I finally found her website and ordered it from there (I had a hard time finding it because I didn't know how to correctly spell her name). The CD arrived quickly and with an incredibly funny shipping insert—I wish I had kept it.

In short, I was not disappointed. Since Berlin has a catalog of over 2000 songs, whitteling down to just 12 selections must've been quite the task in itself. But I could tell each song is thoughtfully arranged, with just the necessary accompanyment. Some songs just have guitar, one just a ukelalie (which Maggart plays herself), while some have piano and violin. Some songs are melancholy, some are light-hearted and one tells a story. Many CDs I buy just for one song, but I listen to all the songs a few times just in case I find an overlooked gem. With this CD, I loved all the songs. I can't find one that is ugly or worthless.

Maggart, the older sister of some musician named Fiona Apple, has several other CDs with different types of songs. I haven't purchased any as of this post, but I will someday. I'll write reviews of those later. I'm sure they're equally as amazing.

I have to end this by saying that my teenage daughter, very much into modern music (most of which I hate), loves this CD. A piano player, she is learning—by her own choice—the music to the songs on this CD. I look forward to purchasing and listening to all the CDs by this somewhat obscure artist.

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