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Randy Newman

In addition to being one of our greatest American singer- songwriters and film composers, Newman long ago established himself among our sharpest and most caustic wits. Calling his inspired new album The Randy Newman Songbook, Vol. I seems like a curiously upbeat and straightforward act for this frequently wry fellow. "Yeah, it's not my style to look ahead with confidence," Newman confesses. "I'm basically asking for it with a title like that. Come to think of it, I could have called it something safer and more horrible like Looking Back At My Life, but I just didn't give it that much thought." If it's not Newman's style to look forward with optimism, it's also not his personal preference to look back, whether in anger or in any other emotion. Yet somehow he still does so brilliantly on The Randy Newman Songbook, Vol. I, his illuminating first effort for the Nonesuch label. The eighteen-song set finds Newman singing and playing piano on powerful new solo versions of his early classics ("I Think It's Going To Rain Today," "Sail Away," "You Can Leave Your Hat On"), his more recent gems ("The World Isn't Fair," "The Great Nations of Europe") as well as a few examples of the Oscar-winning composer's film music (themes from Avalon and Ragtime, as well as "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2) and even a favorite stray obscurity ("Let Me Go," a song originally written for the 1972 Norman Lear movie The Pursuit of Happiness). The resulting album is an intimate and powerful reminder of the enduring work that has established Newman as a songwriter's songwriter -- one of the most musically and lyrically ambitious singer- songwriters ever to be at play in the fields of popular music. Characteristically, Newman offers no hype. "This was something I did at the behest of the record company really," Newman explains matter of factly. "It wasn't something I would have thought to do necessarily -- memorialize my own songs. It's kind of interesting to me to do this project because it does play to history in a way, but in truth that's not as interesting to me personally as new stuff. I like writing new songs, though frankly I don't do that too much either. See I know these songs already but to do them in this way is not a bad thing. It's nice, actually." "Nice" really understates matters considerably.

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Live Review

Randy Newman at the Space in Westbury

Read "Randy Newman at the Space in Westbury" reviewed by Mike Perciaccante


Randy Newman The Space in Westbury Westbury, NY April 6, 2016 Satire is defined as the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues. For the modern world, perhaps satire might best be defined simply and eloquently as--a Randy Newman song. The Oscar, Emmy and Grammy winning songwriter and composer, best-known for his 1977 hit ...

376
Live Review

Randy Newman: Ottawa, Canada, March 28, 2011

Read "Randy Newman: Ottawa, Canada, March 28, 2011" reviewed by John Kelman


Randy NewmanCentrepointe Theatre, Ottawa, Canada March 28, 2011 While it's not been the 25 years that he cited as the time that's passed since his last Ottawa performance--he was actually in town for the 2007 Ottawa Bluesfest--it was his first time playing in a theater setting in Ottawa since the mid-1980s, when he delivered a solo show in the Opera of the National Arts Centre in support of Trouble in Paradise (Reprise, 1983). Still, with ...

382
Album Review

Randy Newman: Harps and Angels

Read "Harps and Angels" reviewed by John Kelman


It's been nine years since Bad Love (Dreamworks SKG, 1999), Randy Newman's last album of original material. In the interim the singer/songwriter moved to Nonesuch for Songbook Vol. 1 (2003), where he revisited some of his favorite songs. As good as it was, it's nice to know that, with Harps and Angels, his pen is as sharp as ever. High expectations were set when he released “A Few Words in Defense of Our Country" in 2007. The iTunes-only ode to ...

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1

Recording

Vocalist Roseanna Vitro Follows Up Her 2011 Grammy-nominated Randy Newman CD With "Clarity: Music Of Clare Fischer," Due Sept. 30

Vocalist Roseanna Vitro Follows Up Her 2011 Grammy-nominated Randy Newman CD With "Clarity: Music Of Clare Fischer," Due Sept. 30

Source: Terri Hinte Publicity

The richly harmonic, deeply melodic music of pianist and composer/arranger Clare Fischer (1928-2012) has proven to be fertile terrain for many jazz and pop artists over the last half-century. Vocalist Roseanna Vitro puts her passionate stamp on nine of Fischer’s compositions (and a favorite of his by Ary Barroso) on her gorgeous new CD Clarity: Music of Clare Fischer, which will be released September 30 by Random Act Records. As on her 2011 Grammy-nominated disc, The Music of Randy Newman, ...

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Recording

Vocalist Roseanna Vitro Debuts on Motema Music with "The Music of Randy Newman" May 17

Vocalist Roseanna Vitro Debuts on Motema Music with "The Music of Randy Newman" May 17

Source: Terri Hinte Publicity

With the release on May 17 of The Music of Randy Newman, her debut CD for Motema Music, Roseanna Vitro stakes a claim as the first jazz vocalist to explore the richly melodic, sharply observant Randy Newman songbook. Having previously covered the music of American icons Ray Charles and Bill Evans in acclaimed album-length projects, Vitro relished the challenge of selecting material from Newman's vast catalog. “What I love about Randy Newman is his ability to tell a story, and ...

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TV / Film

Opportunities for Indie Filmmakers, Pop Composers

Opportunities for Indie Filmmakers, Pop Composers

Source: All About Jazz

For years it was common for studios to cross-market a film with a well known performer, but today niche artists are landing more tracks in films and reaping the spoils, especially around award season.

Glancing at recent best song nominees, offbeat names like “Bird" York ("In the Deep" from “Crash"), A.R. Rahman ("Jai Ho" from “Slumdog Millionaire") and Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard ("Falling Slowly") have slipped into the category, elbowing out bigger artists contributions and often winning. Most studio ...

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Performance / Tour

Randy Newman at Royce Hall

Randy Newman at Royce Hall

Source: Michael Ricci

Randy Newman's best, most pointed songs usually will come around again with enough time, timely once more either from history repeating itself, or mankind living up to his worst expectations. At his concert Friday for UCLA Live at Royce Hall, his quietly wounded and defiant “Louisiana 1927" told of another generation's devastating flood, but had new poignancy in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. And, sadly, the biting, hilarious detail of 1972's “Political Science" may never lose its relevance: “They all ...

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Music Industry

Artists Behind Oscar-Nominated Songs Won't Perform

Artists Behind Oscar-Nominated Songs Won't Perform

Source: All About Jazz

Some of Oscar's most memorable moments have come during performances of nominated songs. Among them: rap group Three 6 Mafia surrounded by streetwalkers as they performed “It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" from “Hustle & Flow" in 2006, and Celine Dion's resplendent performance of the “Titanic" hit, “My Heart Will Go On," in 1998.

Don't expect such musical moments at the 82nd Academy Awards.

The artists behind the year's five nominated songs will not perform during the Oscar telecast. ...

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Performance / Tour

Kat Parsons Does Randy Newman

Kat Parsons Does Randy Newman

Source: All About Jazz

Kat Parsons recorded this song while playing in Fukuoka, Japan. It is one of her favorites. Randy Newman has such a beautiful way.

Fri May 29 EASTON, MD NightCat (formerly Coffee East)@ 8pm 5 Goldsborough St. Call 443-786-2750 for tickets or online at www.annapolisticketscom

It never takes long for Kat Parsons to win over a crowd. From the first time she stepped foot in Eastons Chez Lafitte she started to win over ...

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Recording

Randy Newman Wielding a Lyrical Scalpel to Deliver a Pointed Political Message

Randy Newman Wielding a Lyrical Scalpel to Deliver a Pointed Political Message

Source: Michael Ricci

Of all the assessments of the Bush administration that have been set to pop music, few are as deadpan as Randy Newman's song “A Few Words in Defense of Our Country," which Mr. Newman released last year on iTunes and has included on his first album of new material in nearly a decade, Harps and Angels (Nonesuch). Over the kind of stately piano arrangement he's known for, Mr. Newman, 64, calmly sings that “the leaders we have/While they're the worst ...

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Recording

Randy Newman First CD in Nine Years

Randy Newman First CD in Nine Years

Source: Michael Ricci

Harps and Angels Randy Newman doesn't come 'round often. But when he does, it's worth listening. RANDY NEWMAN strolled along the wooden planks of the Santa Monica Pier on a recent summer afternoon, a balmy ocean breeze rustling his short, curly hair that, at age 64, is mostly salt but retains a dash of pepper. A crowd of onlookers craned their necks in his direction, some with video cameras, others with cellphone cameras, but a female ...

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Performance / Tour

Randy Newman at Largo

Randy Newman at Largo

Source: All About Jazz

Randy Newman (Largo at the Coronet; 280 capacity; $60)

Band: Randy Newman, Mitchell Froom, Joey Waronker, Bob Glaub, George Doering.

Randy Newman's show at Largo kicked off with the title track of “Harps and Angels," which recounts a near-death experience (it wasn't his time, God tells him, just a clerical error), but both the concert and the wonderful new album (due Aug. 5 on Nonesuch) show Newman to be at the height of his powers, writing some of ...

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Performance / Tour

Randy Newman Debuts Songs from New Album for Vip Crowd in L.A.

Randy Newman Debuts Songs from New Album for Vip Crowd in L.A.

Source: All About Jazz

At L.A.'s 280-capacity Largo Newman Crooned New Songs

Randy Newman performed the entirety of his excellent Harps and Angels (due in stores August 5th) for a VIP-packed crowd that included Mandy Moore, Jason Schwartzman and ex- That Dog frontwoman Anna Waronker, whose dad Lenny co-produced Harps with Mitchell Froom. “It never hurts to start with a religious tune," Newman said by way of introduction after opening the show with the album's title track, in which an unbeliever takes a memorable ...

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