by Joel Benjamin for Theaterscene.net

 

 

Jim Speake, the affable singer, brought his autobiographical show, Jim Speake Sings My Generation to the cabaret mecca, Don’t Tell Mama.  All eighteen songs were decidedly of Seventies’ vintage and all of them were familiar to those of us in our late forties and beyond.  It was smart to use material that automatically induced ready-made feelings and images in his audience. Mr. Speake cleverly sang arrangements--by his Music Director Steven Ray Watkins--that kept the essence of these songs as we remember them, yet brought out Mr. Speake’s special persona, which includes a fine, deliciously rough-edged tenor and a boyishness that bordered on the shy. He is a slender, handsome man with graying hair, who projects pleasantness to the n-th degree.

 

Interspersed between the songs Mr. Speake spoke of his upbringing in Alabama, his parents, Annie Lucille & Otto—“spelled the same backwards and forwards!”—and his unavoidable decision to go out on his own, winding up in New York City where he has had a reasonably successful career as a singer/actor.  Casually dressed in a black blazer, jeans and white shirt, he presented a gimmick-free program that opened with “Up Up and Away” and finished with “I’ve Got the Music In Me.”  At first he seemed a bit stilted in his movements, but opened up both vocally and physically with Jim Croce’s “You Don’t Mess Around with Jim,” to which he added a mini-medley of other songs.  Once warmed up, he still moved about minimally, but seemed more full-bodied and connected with the material.  By the time he sang the last three songs, “Solitaire,” by Neil Sedaka, Billy Joel’s “My Life” and the afore-mentioned “I’ve Got the Music In Me,” by Bias Boshell, he was firmly committed to the sub-texts of the songs and their meanings and My Generation became a fulfilling expression of both his strong vocal instrument and his life story.

 

His back-up singers, Wendy A. Russell and Lennie Watts (who doubled as the show’s director) were remarkable in their ease and comraderie.  Along with Mr. Watkins on the keyboard were the terrific musicians Jerry Smith on the drums and Dan Fabricatore on the bass guitar who let Mr. Speake shine in his own right while keeping the musical standards high.

 

JIM SPEAKE SINGS MY GENERATION  

December 14^th 2009 at 7:30 PM

Don’t Tell Mama

343 West 46^th St.

New York, NY

Information & Reservations:  212-757-0788 & www.DontTellMamaNYC.com

Contact Jim Speake at www.jimspeake.com