Music Review: Melissa Errico – Sondheim in the City 

Melissa Errico: Sondheim in the City (Concord Theatrical Recordings).

Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

In a recent interview last fall in New York City, I asked Melissa Errico what her new Sondheim project was and why she was doing it. 

She replied: “Okay. I won’t keep it a secret! The new album is called Sondheim in the City, and it’s a compendium of Steve’s songs about New York. It’s a more exterior, out-reaching kaleidoscopic album than the first one, which was all interior and, I hope, bewitching. I sing with a big band on many tracks on this one, and on some even with strings! It’s a kind of throwback to Ella Fitzgerald’s songbook albums, but it’s a chance for me to inhabit the many faces of the Sondheim woman.” 

Following her recent week-long residency at New York’s Birdland Jazz Club, Errico finally had the release party for the recording, and the good news is that this Sondheim album is even more gorgeous than her first, Sondheim Sublime. 

What differentiates this album from those recorded by other Broadway divas is that it’s jazz-adjacent and not arranged by theatre musicians or composers but, at the same time, it evokes the intentions of the great master, who wouldn’t have wanted the album to turn out any other way. He trusted Errico’s vision because she came from the world of musical theatre and had interpreted his work on the stage already: Sunday in the Park With George at the Kennedy Center in 2002, and in 2013 Passion at the Classic Stage Company and (2016) Do I Hear a Waltz? – the only musical Sondheim wrote with music by Richard Rodgers, the writing partner of his mentor Oscar Hammerstein II – for New York City Center’s Encores! series. 

As arranged by Tedd Firth and Rob Mathes, many familiar titles are given a new jazzier flavour, notably ‘Another Hundred People’ from Company, ‘What More Do I Need?’ from Saturday Night, and ‘Everybody Says Don’t’ from Anyone Can Whistle. As for the cut songs, ‘Can That Boy Foxtrot!’ and ‘Uptown, Downtown’, both from Follies, are given the full big band treatment.   

Opening the CD with ‘Dawn’, from the unproduced movie musical Singing Out Loud, we are definitely in for a journey more into the unknown than into Sondheim’s greatest hits, as even the often more recorded title song from Anyone Can Whistle, ‘Take Me to the World’ from TV’s Evening Primrose and ‘Being Alive’ from Company are given a personal touch by the talented Errico. 

The gender-swapping is an interesting twist in ‘Sorry-Grateful’ from Company and ‘Good Thing Going’ from Merrily We Roll Along, probably my own personal favourite Sondheim. ‘It Wasn’t Meant to Happen (Follies) is another highlight of the album, especially since it foreshadows ‘Send in the Clowns’ both in form and content. 

Throughout the CD, we can indeed feel the vibe of the New York City, where Sondheim lived and created his masterpieces. As the title suggests, the city is definitely the main character of this concept album, from those coming in (‘Another Hundred People’) to those wanting to leave – “Who wants to live in New York?” she asks in ‘Opening Doors’ – to the ‘Broadway Baby’ that Errico will always be in her heart and soul and for our greatest pleasure.

This indispensable album is testimony to how much the city has been celebrating Sondheim in return – now more than ever; the production of his unfinished work Here We Are ran simultaneously with Sweeney Todd and Merrily We Roll Along on Broadway, the latter is sell-out (four decades after the original 1981 production closed after 16 performances and 44 previews). 

We can’t wait until Errico’s return to London for a live concert of this brilliant recording. 

Patrick Honoré