Walking through the piano-bar/lounge after a show at Judys cabaret one recent night I heard a delightful voice accompanied by Jerry Scott at the piano. I was tempted to stay to hear the singer though I had no idea who she was, but my friends and I were on our way out. Her lovely soprano sound wafted out into 44th Street (it's a big voice) as we waited for a cab and somebody said she was Stephanie Cheek. I recalled seeing her name on Judys cabaret schedule and determined right then and there to catch her show. Well, one thing and another and a lot of nights running around to hear other singers, I finally made it on her closing night. The wait was worth it, though had I heard her earlier, I might have gone back to hear her again. Judys is closing at the end of this month but booker/owner Richard Hendrickson tells me that when he opens his new room (he hopes in the fall) that he wants to present this lady early and often. Now to tell you about her show which was directed by Hope Hardcastle and musically directed an arranged by superb pianist Wes McAfee - the songs were obviously selected to show off her clear bell-like soprano and express her point of view. Ms. Cheek is very much a woman of the nineties and she lets you know it with songs like the title song of the show "Woman In The Moon," but she is not without a sense of humor which she shows by prefacing that song with Jerry Herman's "The Man In The Moon Is A Lady". Her takes on the touching "When You Wish Upon A Star" and the plaintive "Feed The Birds" are lovely and sweet. She lightens up the proceedings with Andre Previn/Comden & Green's "I Said Good Morning", an always amusing chestnut in which the singer perkily greets the sun, the hills and all the many creatures of the farmyard by which point it is time to wish them goodnight and then it is morning again ad infinitum until exhaustion sets in. She talks of auditioning for "The Sound of Music" and, before she has a chance to sing, being "typed out" (show business jargon for not being physically right for the director's vision of the role) so she sings her audition song for us. It is Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Cockeyed Optimist" which the Lord knows is the perfect song for the Broadway baby facing the rejections of the audition process. The show has a remarkable scope in which Ms. Cheek reveals many facets of her personality in her songs. She closes with the Stephen Flaherty/Lynn Ahrens' "Back to Before" and encores with Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" and leaves you feeling that in this 50 minute hour, you have come to know her a good bit and want to know her more. Asked about her future plans when we talked after the performance, she said, with a twinkle in her eyes, that her next show will be "all about sex." I, for one, am looking forward to it and I suggest you keep your eyes and ears open for her next go round. |