BEAT KAESTLI

Happy, Sad and Satisfied.

2006-01-31

Only the music gurus at WYCE can find stuff like this: Swiss jazz. Young singer/arranger Beat Kaestli (born and raised in Switzerland, but now a NYC crooner) is in the Harry Connick, Jr. mode and while we don’t need even more versions of “Autumn Leaves” (what is up with everyone covering that chestnut over the last year?), this kid’s strength is in his arrangements and his instrumental compadres.

I think the disc gets better in the second half, with the instrumentation carrying cuts #7-#10. Listen especially to the trumpet in “So in Love,” the bass and sax in “Tenderly” and the organ in the interesting set-closer “I (Who Have Nothing)” * who remembers Tom Jones singing that on Top 40 radio? It is also different to hear a male lead on Gershwin’s “Summertime.” If this youngster wants to make it, my advice is to keep up the good work on the arrangements and choose less predictable numbers; that’s what makes the second half of this CD more intriguing.

1/06 MJVD Jazz-Contemporary (vocal)

More reviews tagged #Jazz

  • reviewed 04/2006

    Joris Teepe's Gronigan Art Ensemble
    Jazz In Jazz Out

  • reviewed 09/2006

    MSMW
    Out Louder

  • reviewed 06/2008

    STRING PLANET
    Songs From the Home Planet

  • reviewed 12/2005

    Ivo Antognini Jazz Project
    Feggari Mou

  • reviewed 05/2007

    Spanish Harlem Orchestra
    United We Swing

  • reviewed 05/2004

    Bill Charlap Trio
    Somewhere: The Music of Leonard Bernstein

Compiled by the WYCE Journalism Club

The opinions expressed in these reviews are those of the individual volunteers that submitted the article and do not necessarily reflect the views of WYCE or GRCMC; nor its staff, donors, or affiliates.