Romance on Film / Romance on Broadway
Cabaret singer turned croonerMichael Feinsteincontinues to pay tribute to the American popular standard in his two-disc setRomance on Film, Romance on Broadway. The first disc features Feinstein in front of a live audience singing mostly well-worn ballads from classic films (exception: you may not immediately associate Michel LeGrand and Alan and Marilyn Bergman's "How Do You Keep the Music Playing?" with the 1982 Burt Reynolds-Goldie Hawn vehicleBest Friends). The second disc is a studio recording filled with ballads and the occasional swinger ("Taking a Chance on Love") from Broadway shows. Accompanied by different combinations of horns and rhythm, Feinstein often stretches a song out to six or seven minutes, thus allowing for relaxed tempos, granting solo opportunities to his first-rate instrumentalists (including pianistsAlan BroadbentandMarian McPartland), and indulging his fondness for what he calls the "sighing moment"--when he puzzles the audience with an unknown verse to a song, and then gives them the familiar, satisfying, well-loved chorus. Feinstein might rely a bit too much on his falsetto and there isn't the same sense of wit and adventure of hiscabaret years, but this is a classy, enjoyable album for late-night listening.--David Horiuchi