Benita Hill - I'll See You In My Song (2006)

All who hear Benita Hill might be considered privileged, but I, having accompanied her, am doubly lucky. I’ll See You in My Song, though, takes the listener about as close as one can go to the heart of her music without actually playing with her on a gig. Benita’s exquisite phrasing, not to mention her ability to caress every nuance from a lyric, stand her out among even the best singers of our time. What’s most impressive to me is how much expression she achieves by simply singing the melody. Without even a single, show-offish scat, she uses a few well-timed oohs to turn “Go Slow” into a memorable experience. And her graceful negotiation of the difficult leaps in Bob Dorough’s “Love Came on Stealthy Fingers” draw attention not to her technique, strong though it is, but to the song. That in and of itself would win over any listener or even jaded accompanist, but add to it the fact that some of these great songs â€" six, to be exact â€" are in fact co-written by Benita, and her conquest is complete: As a writer, too, she knows how to capture the class and resonance and staying power of the older gems she covers so well. Her performances leave me in love with all these wonderful tunes, and that, to me, is what the great song stylists do. I can¹t wait to start playing them myself ¬ or to put this CD on again and hear Benita do them as they deserve to be done.