Maude Maggart: With Sweet Despair

I requested this CD for Christmas (2007) because I was so blown away by her previous release, Maude Maggart Sings Irving Berlin (my review of that CD). I wasn't put off that she was singing a different type of music on this CD, namely Depression-era songs, by such composers as Harry Warren, Marshall Barer and Cole Porter. I wasn't put off because I wasn't familiar with Berlin's songs and loved that CD.

So, the next time I got in my car (where I do most of my music listening), I popped it in. The first song, "Beyond Compare," started playing. The opening was awkward, but it had to get better, I reasoned, because this was, after all, Maude Maggart. Every selection from her Berlin album was beautiful, lyrical and sometimes haunting. So I cringed through the entire first song. It never got any better. If anything, it got worse.

I hoped the second song would be better, but I was disappointed. It too was tuneless and flat and unpleasent to listen to. I sat through the next few songs, but every one was awful and usually dull. As far as I know, Maggart was singing them correctly, but none of the songs had an identifiable melody. They were random wanderings of sound. And Maggart was probably doing her best to insert feeling into songs that didn't have any.

I fast forwarded to the first few seconds of the remaining songs, but they were all equally horrible. I couldn't identify one gem among the 12 songs on the album. It looks like the $23.00 for the CD (yes, it was $23!) was a total waste. And it's not the fact that these songs were sad—in subject matter, not quality—many of the songs on her Irving Berlin album were equally, if not moreso, melancholy. But I loved every single one of them. But these songs, every one of them, were just dreck. I couldn't force myself to like them.

However, I'm not the only one who holds this opinion. My daughter also loved the Berlin CD. So much so that she "borrowed it" to fall asleep to. Several of the songs on the CD she wanted to learn to play on the piano she loved them so much. But she too hated this CD and couldn't beleive it was the same performer.

Now, the fact of the matter may be that we are not the target demographic for this music. Maybe there is a sizeable market for tuneless songs that make the listener want to ram a pool cue in one ear drum and out the other just to block the horrible sounds emenating from his stereo speakers. But I'm certainly not one of them. Perhaps if you enjoy songs from Cole Porter and the other composers I've never heard of you'll enjoy this CD. After all, I can't imagine Maggart was singing the songs incorrectly, but how can you make an awful song sound good? So, take a chance if you're a fan of Depresssion-era music. But otherwise, stay far away from this CD with some of the worst music it's ever been my misfortune to hear.

Despite the terrible, terrible, terrible music on this CD, I'm still willing to give Maggart's other CDs a spin. She has at least two others (as of this writing)—Look for the Silver Lining and Live—that I'd like to hear. But for pity's sake, I hope they are more similar to Maggart's Berlin CD than this conglomeration of dreck.

Similar posts

• Maude Maggart Sings Irving Berlin