Ruth Carlin

Kevin Scott Hall
"SongMoments" The Duplex  –  June 28, 30, July 25 In her new show, "SongMoments," Ruth Carlin showed herself to be a quirky, likeable singer true to her art and her heart. With her unique, cinnamon-tinged, tremulous alto, Carlin conveyed both strength and vulnerability in a program that displayed intelligent song choices from an interesting variety...

Brian d’Arcy James

Roy Sander
"Under the Influence" 54 Below  –  June 26 - 30 Brian d'Arcy James comes to 54 Below with "Under the Influence," an evening of pop songs that influenced him when he was growing up in Michigan in the '80s. Though he has enjoyed considerable success and recognition for his work on- and off-Broadway and in television...

Maude Maggart

Mark Dundas Wood
"Into the Garden" Feinstein's at Loews Regency  –  June 5 - 16 The selections Maude Maggart sings in "Into the Garden" are not your father's pop songs. More likely they'd have been on your great-grandfather's play list. Maggart focuses mainly on music written a century or so ago. According to press notes, the show was...

Patti LuPone

Roy Sander
"Far Away Places" 54 Below  –  June 5 – 23 54 Below has certainly opened with a bang. Patti LuPone's two-week engagement was a complete sell-out, and now a third week has been added. When I attended, the audience greeted her entrance with abandoned applause, and then proceeded to reward her turns with so many extended...

Carly Sakolove

Roy Sander
"I Hear Voices" The Duplex  –  June 4, 8, 12; added performances June 21, 29 A YouTube video of Carly Sakolove singing Sondheim's "Send in the Clowns" as a dozen different "Broadway Divas" was picked by Time as one of the top ten web videos of 2010, and to date it has had over 115,000...

Mx. Justin Vivian Bon

Roy Sander
54 Below  –  Mondays, June 4 – July 9; Friday-Saturday July 20-21 Justin Vivian Bond comes on stage at 54 Below in an elegant long black dress slit up the left side to reveal a swell pair of gams. V's hair is long and blonde, and v's jewelry and elbow-length gloves are stylish. V starts to...

Elaine St. George

Mark Dundas Wood
"Take Me As I Am" Metropolitan Room  –  June 6, 7, 13, 14 In "Take Me As I Am"—billed as "a witty & opinionated look at Joni Mitchell on relationships"— Elaine St. George performs a spate of songs written by or otherwise associated with Mitchell. Some selections were penned by Mitchell's romantic partners (Graham Nash, James...

William Blake

Kevin Scott Hall
"Echoes of Etta: A Tribute to Etta James" Birdland – June 4 When a white male soul singer bursts onto the scene, a fair number of people probably sit back, arms crossed, and take an attitude of "Okay, this I gotta see." Even in our multi-cultural age, such genre-crossing between the races is a rarity,...

Jennifer Sheehan

Kevin Scott Hall
"I Know a Place" Feinstein's at Loews Regency  –  May 23 - June 2 How refreshing it is, in an age when self-promotion and a jaded attitude trump other attributes, that an artist like Jennifer Sheehan, who epitomizes niceness in every way, can make a splash in the upper echelons of New York's cabaret world....

André De Shields

Kevin Scott Hall
"Black By Popular Demand" Laurie Beechman Theatre  –  May 4, 11, 18 It has been a while since André De Shields—celebrated for his work on and off Broadway, and once a fixture in New York nightclubs—has graced our cabaret stages. Thus, a packed house greeted him raucously at his show at the Laurie Beechman Theatre, "Black...