 
 Pick
a Bond girl. Honey Ryder, Pussy Galore, Tiffany
Case. Any one will do. Now, picture her in
some badly lighted bar cooing smoky ballads,
tight quartet at her rear. Such is the scintillating
essence of Jodi Stevens' Girl
Talk (Sons
of Sound).
Cool as a shaken martini, the Broadway ingénue's
first solo album was, she says, "inspired
by my grandfather, [who] was a bandleader
in New York City in the '40s and '50s. My
love of standards began with him and slowly
took shape as I grew up."
Created as a tribute to "strong, independent
women who have changed the face of pop and
jazz," Stevens' "celebration of
femininity"
extends from the "quiet kittenish strength"
of Peggy Lee (sassily saluted with a sizzling
"I'm A Woman") and "unassuming
softness"
of Julie London, to a steamy "Come On-a
My House" that redefines the sensuous
curves of Rosie Clooney's signature hit. "It
is a very sexy song," coos
Stevens, "and there's
another verse I sometimes perform in my one-woman
show [a live version of Girl Talk]
that kicks it over to really naughty, but
I decided
to leave it off the album because I wanted
to stay as true as possible to the original."
To help shape her multihued homage, Stevens
had the "extreme good luck" to work with
a top-drawer combo led by pianist Ted Rosenthal
and bassist Jay Leonhart. Soon afterward,
she returned the favor by contributing a
delectable "My Romance" to Leonhart's latest,
Rodgers & Leonhart.
A gal who can't say no when it comes to
charitable causes, Stevens can also be heard
on Kurt Weill: The Centennial, an
all-star celebration on behalf of the Actors'
Fund
of American, and along-side David Gaines
and Sam Harris on a soon-to-be-released Johnny
Mercer collection in support of the LA AIDS
Project. More recently, she's swapped the
worldly sophistication of Weill and Mercer
for the rough-and-tumble grit of Mickey Gilley.
Tapped for the female lead in a Broadway-bound
musical adaptation of Urbvan Cowboy, she's
having "such a hoot. As an actor I love
having the opportunity to really cross over.
It's
your typical old-fashioned love story in
a country-and-western setting, and the timing
is perfect. I mean, what could be better
than a good ol' Texas musical with our good
ol' Texas boy in
the
White House?"
~ Christopher Loudon
© 2003
JazzTimes
photograph
by Ebet Roberts
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