Not So Quiet Nights

Diana Krall
Schermerhorn Symphony Center, Nashville, TN
Sunday, July 12, 2009

Usually when an artists tours to promote a new album, you can expect the setlist to draw heavily from their latest release, with a sprinkling of their back catalog thrown in for good measure. But anyone who went to the Schermerhorn Symphony Center Sunday night expecting to hear a heavy dose of the bossa nova sounds of Diana Krall's new album probably left disappointed. Until the two song encore of the "Quiet Nights" and "The Boy from Ipanema," Krall and her quartet played just two songs from her Quiet Nights. Instead the sold out crowd got treated to a set that drew most heavily from her 1999 Verve debut When I Look In Your Eyes, and beyond that seemed to be designed more along the eclectic tastes of Krall herself rather than an audience that probably came to her the standards they are more familiar with. There were recurring themes of Nat King Cole and Peggy Lee (each had two of their songs performed), a bit of Burt Bacharach, and Tom Waits' "Jockey Full of Bourbon."

Though Krall has often been marketed to a more easy listening crowd, her quartet's performance Sunday night was about as pure jazz as you can get. Guitarist Anthony Wilson, drummer Jeff Hamilton, and bassist Robert Hurst all got multiple chances to shine throughout the set, and their take on "Devil May Care" was so fast that most speed metal bands would have had a hard time keeping up. After "I'll String Along With You" was bizarrely disrupted by the sound of crashing dishes, Krall joked about it being like the "good old days," when she made her living playing in piano bars. Obviously she's come a long way from the resaurants of Vancouver.

Diana Krall - "Where Or When" (mp3) from Quiet Nights

photo by Andrew Budwey