Tierney Sutton claims she had never really encountered
Joni Mitchell until she heard the songwriter's 2000 album
Both Sides Now, a collection mainly comprised of standards. (An album she holds in the same regard as
Frank Sinatra's
In the Wee Small Hours and
Billie Holiday's
Lady in Satin.) In 2011 she performed four of
Mitchell's songs during a performance with the
Turtle Island String Quartet; that gig set this project in motion.
After Blue is
Sutton's first offering that doesn’t include her regular band -- its members were involved with other projects at the time. Instead, her collaborators are a collection of jazz luminaries who include
Peter Erskine,
Larry Goldings,
Ralph Humphrey,
Hubert Laws, the
TISQ, and
Al Jarreau, who duets on "Be Cool" (the only track to feature one of
Sutton's own musicians, bassist
Kevin Axt).
Sutton reads
Mitchell by moving through the songwriter's various creative periods, embracing the singer/songwriter's jazz leanings in her phrasing, improvisation, and syncopation, and their shared love of the Great American Songbook. This last notion is evidenced by
Sutton's version of "Don’t Go to Strangers" and "Answer Me My Love," both of which
Mitchell poignantly delivered on
Both Sides Now. She also seamlessly melds closer "Freeman in Paris" with "April in Paris." Other standouts include "Blue" and "Little Green" with
TISQ, the fingerpopping "The Dry Cleaner from Des Moines" with
Laws,
Erskine, and
Goldings, and the swinging, thoroughly re-envisioned "Big Yellow Taxi." On "Both Sides Now," she is accompanied only by
Mark Summer's cello. For those accustomed to hearing
Sutton re-interpreting standards from the golden era,
After Blue retains her trademark gifts of phrasing, restraint, and emotional honesty. But as an album, it is just as remarkable as
Herbie Hancock's
The Joni Letters in its creative rapprochement of
Mitchell's music with the jazz tradition, and reveals
Sutton at a vocal and interpretive peak. ~ Thom Jurek