Jazz Reviews : Julie Kelly Keeps Her Balance at Alfonse’s

You have to admire singer Julie Kelly for her willingness to take chances. Rather than just sing her songs according to the book, Kelly fussed with a lot of them Thursday night at Alfonse’s in North Hollywood, offering horn-like stances. Sometimes she was able to walk this tightrope, sometimes she fell into the net.

Happily, she mostly stayed on her feet. On “At Long Last Love,” she crammed lyrics into smaller spaces than they were intended to go, then exotically stretched out the subsequent ones as if she were pulling taffy. On “A Sleepin’ Bee,” she swayed between an infectious syncopated rhythm and snappy, on-the-beat time.

In “Agua de Beber,” where she danced over the bubbling Brazilian beat provided by drummer Mike Stephans, bassist Dave Enos and pianist Will Boulware, Kelly was at her creative best. She would sing a lyric line, then follow it with a scat phrase, or she would shout or speak a lyric, then croon the next one.

On a couple of the ballads, she lost her balance, particularly “Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out to Dry.” Here, when she rushed lyrics or purposely hit an edgy pitch, she greatly diminished the tune’s native sentimentality.

But on “Some Other Time”--where at one point she had rhythmic help from club owner Charlie Chiarenza, who hammered up a poster as she sang--a sumptuous “The Meaning of the Blues” and the evening’s tour de force, “All My Tomorrows,” she took no liberties and delivered bursting-with-emotion performances.

Boulware and Enos, subbing for Tom Garvin and Tom Warrington, Kelly’s regular accompanists, gave solid support. Stephans, who knows Kelly’s moves, was a definite, tasty plus.