30
After 1988's20and 1992's25, Harry Connick adds another chapter to his series of pared-down piano-and-voice albums.30is essentially a man and his keys--you have to wait until the fifth track, "If I Were a Bell," for a bass to finally sneak in. Connick starts things off with Fats Domino's "I'm Walkin'" and continues with another low-down boogie, an instrumental version of the Mack Gordon/Harry Warren song "Chattanooga Choo Choo." The material's fairly conservative (Connick's a traditionalist through and through) and usually fulfills its relatively modest aims--which, after all, is more than can be said about many records. Cole Porter's "Don't Fence Me In," for instance, acquires a nice boogie shuffle.Wynton Marsalisadds understated trumpet to the last track, "I'll Only Miss Her (When I Think of Her)," but the Reverend James Moore's vocals on "There Is Always One More Time" are a little too overheated in this record's minimal context.--Elisabeth Vincentelli