Increasingly, we live in an “un-nuanced” age, where gimmicky and formulaic music is manufactured for “target audiences”. However, every now and then, someone comes along and reminds us what music can be. Jamie Broumas is such an artist. Her new CD is not only a very personal and eloquent statement; it is also a bold effort to contribute interesting, layered, meaningful and complex art into the contemporary jazz scene.
The more one listens to Jamie’s subtle and sophisticated music-making, the more one discovers the additional layers of her artistic and creative sensibilities. Her style is subtle but strong. It bears hints of her influences, but is very much her own. She uses color, space, inflection and nuanced phrasing to bring life to the lyrics and depth to the music. Her voice, a rich instrument, is a flexible tool that purveys deep musical meaning. And she swings!
Jamie always knew she was a singer, but in her late teens, when a musician friend introduced her to the famous recording, “Ella in Berlin”, a door opened. Already on her way to Vassar College where she took a degree in classical music, she became drawn to jazz and spent a semester pursuing this interest at The Berklee College of Music. After college, she returned to Washington and her talent was quickly recognized by many great players and singers, notably Shirley Horn, Buck Hill, and two of the players on this CD: Charlie Young and Steve Williams. In the mid 1980’s, Jamie took a job with the popular and dynamic vocal quartet, Rare Silk with whom she spent a busy period touring. Afterwards, she returned to Washington, where she had a steady gig at Washington’s legendary jazz club, “The One Step Down” and the encouragement and friendship of the D.C. jazz community.
In the early 1990s, Tony Bennett’s bassist Paul Langosch introduced Jamie to pianist Steve Rudolph. Steve at one time toured extensively with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and eventually landed in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where he is now very active in the east coast jazz scene. For more than a dozen years, Jamie became a regular performer in Harrisburg and she and Steve bonded musically. When Jamie felt it was time to make this CD, she enlisted Steve Rudolph; her two old friends from D.C.: drummer Steve Williams, who worked with Monty Alexander for a time and with Shirley Horn for 25 years; Charlie Young, the lead alto player in the Ellington band; and bassist Michael Bowie, a veteran player and collaborator with many important jazz artists including Sarah Vaughan, Betty Carter, Abby Lincoln, Joe Williams, and the Manhattan Transfer.
The songs and musicians Jamie has chosen for this recording represent an extraordinary confluence of material and talent. The musicians are certainly some of the best on the current scene and the session is a great example of the distinct and swinging Washington sound. Jamie’s song choices on this recording deal with love in its many and various forms from wild to wistful. Each song provides a vignette of an ineffable feeling. All have great melodies and lyrics that tell a rich story and give a very nuanced portrait of Jamie Broumas!
--Bill Goodwin, April 2007