Carmen McRae - At The Great American Music Hall (1977/2014) [HDTracks]

Recorded over a three-night engagement at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco in 1976, jazz vocalist Carmen McRae presents this eclectic selection of jazz standards and a handful of pop songs including a surprising cover of Alice Cooper's ballad Only Women Bleed.

Carmen McRae has always shined on stage, and this fine account of her 1976 three-night stand at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco proves the point. Couched in that stellar Blue Note sound, McRae ranges far and wide on a set of standards. And McRae not only spices things up with an impressive reading of the bossa nova standard "Dindi," but she even goes completely out of her expected domain with a version of the Alice Cooper ballad "Only Woman Bleed" -- interesting, to say the least. Surprisingly, though, she turns this FM hit into one of the most effective performances here. The whole recording is remarkable, for that matter. And this, no doubt, can be traced to the McRae's choice of backing, which includes the venerable Dizzy Gillespie on trumpet and future drumming heavyweight Joey Baron. A must for McRae fans. --AllMusic Review by Stephen Cook