When the jazz singer Blossom Dearie died recently at age 82, the New York Times described her as a “cult chanteuse,” explaining that the six Verve label albums she recorded in the late 1950s, “are today regarded as cult classics.”
This was meant to be a compliment, I suppose, implying that Miss Dearie’s followers are a fervent band–a musical elite of sorts–zealously devoted to her quirky, seductive singing style. As words go, however, “cult” has a decidedly pejorative edge, and the Times seemed to be suggesting that Blossom Dearie’s fans–and by extension, camp followers of traditional jazz–are a rarified bunch, slightly out of step with the popular musical mainstream, perhaps hovering somewhere above it.
If so, I was pleased to count myself among them. Blossom Dearie–her real name, by the way; she was born Marguerite Blossom Dearie, the daughter of a Scottish immigrant–was not to everyone’s taste, but I found her high-pitched, understated style quite appealing, especially combined (as it usually was) with a subtle, unerring sense of swing. Not least, she was one of those singers who accompanied herself on the piano–a feat of musical dexterity that I, as a jazz pianist wannabe, find impossible to comprehend. See if you can track down a video of Mel Torme playing and singing “When Sunny Gets Blue,” and you’ll see what I mean.
As for Blossom Dearie, her death is an occasion for mourning, but not undue sadness. Like the luckier jazz musicians, she had a solid core following and remained in demand until age and infirmity shut down her nightclub/cabaret career a couple of years ago. Unlike many jazz musicians, if she was afflicted with vices, they seem not to have affected her capacity to perform or ability to earn a living. She was, according to the Times obituary, “an independent spirit who zealously guarded her privacy”–one of those journalistic phrases designed to raise eyebrows–but the only thing the outside world knew about her was her music.
Which is fine with me. One of the many things I don’t like about the late Billie Holliday–I speak here as a heretic–is the extent to which her admirers remind us that she lived the lyrics of her songs, or that the pain you perceive in, say, “Fine and Mellow” is searingly autobiographical. To which I say: That’s nice, but would it be asking too much to hit the right note and stay in time? Blossom Dearie’s voice–curiously girlish, throaty, almost hushed in tone–is clear as a bell and her rhythmic sense is impeccable.
When I learned that she had died I consulted YouTube and found a clip of her performing on “The Tonight Show,” introduced by Jack Paar. I would guess that the year is 1961. The camera finds her seated at the piano, her characteristic page-boy blonde hairdo in place, a drummer to the left and bass player in the background. We never actually see the keyboard, but Blossom Dearie’s arms move up and down and back and forth as she sings a slow, methodical version of “Surrey With the Fringe on Top.”
It is a bravura performance. Her subtle phrasing infuses a measure of wit and charm into Oscar Hammerstein’s otherwise saccharine lyrics, and her sense of swing and jazz timing–playing around with the beat, pushing the tone slightly up, down, or sideways–is diabolical. Her voice seems never to rise more than a few notches above a whisper, but the minor changes in key and little vocal arpeggios are perfectly done. A fair-to-middling Broadway tune is transformed into a small gem of a jazz composition.
It’s a pleasant thing to watch, very infectious, and something of an artifact as well. Blossom Dearie is one of the great song stylists of jazz–in a line of succession that includes, say, Ella Fitzgerald and Anita O’Day–but you have to wonder where it all leads. There are younger singers who perform in the tradition of the American Songbook–Stacey Kent is a favorite of mine–but as the Times would put it, nowadays they are closer to cult favorites than widely popular. Jazz has never enjoyed a mass audience–it came closest during the swing era of the 1930s–and is today one of those rarified tastes, like opera, that thrives in a modest niche in the musical universe.
That clip of Blossom Dearie on The Tonight Show is a case in point. Does anyone imagine that Conan O’Brien, soon to succeed Jay Leno in the pilot’s seat, will invite anyone remotely resembling Blossom Dearie to perform on his Tonight Show? The world that we glimpse in that brief excerpt–The Tonight Show broadcast live (in black and white!) from New York, its audience applauding a delicate jazz performance, the collective awareness of an older Broadway tune–is fully as exotic, in the early 1960s, as a surrey with the fringe on top.
Philip Terzian is the literary editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
