Shaking Free
Freelon isn't much of a lyricist (a typically stiff couplet is "We have come to  find/ Intimate connection of heart and mind"), but she has a sure instinct for the way  melody flows. Her soprano isn't overpowering, but it is extremely graceful and thus  perfectly fits the easy-going songs she writes and chooses. Her road band of  pianist/arranger Bill Anschell, bassist John Brown and drummer Woody Williams are  also well attuned to this approach; after two-plus years together, the four musicians seem  to glide as one. The album does include standards by Harold Arlen, Jimmy Van Heusen  and the like, but the highlights are a leisurely treatment of Dizzy Gillespie's "Birk's  Works" and a dreamy version of the old folk tune "Black Is the Color of My True Love's  Hair."--Geoffrey Himes