Fern Lindzon - Moments Like These

[randyhersom]

Fern Lindzon is a friend I've known from Scrabble tournaments for many years. She mentioned being a jazz singer, but I never had a chance to hear her over the years. Former World Scrabble Champion Joel Wapnick is a music professor at McGill University in Toronto (well, actually Montreal as pointed out below), and has been a teacher and mentor in both the music and Scrabble worlds.

She just posted the news a week or two ago on our Scrabble mailing list that her debut CD was coming out, and I now have a copy. Her voice is quite beautiful, and her selection of material quite excellent. She's written her own lyrics to Infant Eyes, Stolen Moments and Maiden Voyage, accompanying herself on piano, with one other musician on each track. Don Thompson on vibes is the best known, but the guitarist and bassist are also quite excellent. The opener, I Thought About You, is delightful and probably my favorite so far. It's the most playful and swinging track here, but the more serious tunes have their own rewards.

Time is short for the moment, so I'll post more later, and may invite Fern to join us here. If I do, please don't treat her as a spammer, it's my idea.

Edited February 6, 2008 by randyhersom

[Ted O'Reilly]

Whoops! McGill University is in Montreal, not Toronto, Randy. Has been there since 1821, though Fern's in Toronto, and of much more recent vintage.

Fern's someone I've known from music, not Scrabble. She's a more than competent pianist and a singer with a lovely warm and intimate voice. Nothing revolutionary, but a deep understanding of lyrics and words, as you might expect of a Scrabble champ. And she sings in tune!

Her accompanists on the new release are top rank: Don Thompson as you note is best-known, but probably on bass or piano rather than vibes (which I think he loves to play more than any other of his many axes). Reg Schwager is a fabulous guitarist, the successor to Ed Bickert 'round these parts, and believe me: that's saying a LOT. He's been George Shearing's choice in the last decade. Bassist George Koller is a free spirit and free thinker who always brings a fresh look at the material. These three often work with Ms. Lindzon, so there's an ease and comfort level to the performances.

I've been enjoying Fern's CD for the last couple of weeks, and I'm glad to see someone else appreciates it.

(And she's anything but a spammer: quite modest, but fine talent!) (BTW your use of Q so frequently -- three "quites" -- earns 25 bonus points).

[randyhersom]

I was fooled on first listen by the similarity of first few bars of Estate to Maiden Voyage, but Maiden Voyage isn't on here, and I don't know if Fern has written lyrics to that. My second favorite track so far is Re'i first recorded by an Israeli band including adherents of both Judaism and Islam. This is despite the fact that it's sung in a language I don't know. Don Thompson is delightful on the tracks he plays on, very tuned in to what Fern is doing. And yes, the opener starts out with solo guitar that sets the tone wonderfully.

I was prepared to dislike TR7 after reading the liner notes, but I never quite got there. They acutally pull it off, a serialist blues. It's one of the three instrumental tracks on the album.