Torme Is Best Part of Star-Filled Tribute

Who’s the best choice to star in a tribute to Mel Torme? Maureen McGovern, for sure, since she performed with Torme on dozens of concerts. So, too, Cleo Laine and John Dankworth, veteran jazz artists with a strong musical linkage to Torme. Add clarinetist Ken Peplowski and the trio that accompanied Torme in his last years, Torme’s son, Steve March Torme, and bring in actor-magician Harry Anderson to host the show and you’ve got a pretty good package.

But John Clayton, co-leader of the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra and director of the Hollywood Bowl’s Lexus Jazz at the Bowl summer series, realized that something was missing, even in such a sterling lineup. So he wisely structured Wednesday night’s tribute program around the audio and video presence of the only person who could really star in such an event--Torme himself.

Toward that end, large video screens were placed on both sides of the Bowl. And the live portions of the program were interlaced with a series of visual segments embracing Torme’s life, from precocious young musical virtuoso to potent jazz elder statesman. For anyone not familiar with Torme’s extraordinary range of talents, it was an illuminating experience. Clips of him in action at the drums, singing smooth-phrased ballads, scatting with Ella Fitzgerald, dueting with Judy Garland, acting (and receiving an Emmy nomination), flying a plane, building and collecting model trains--he was, by any definition, a renaissance man.

A talent display of that magnitude was tough competition--even on video. But McGovern was up to the task, singing with astonishing musical facility. Her scatting on “I’m Late” and “Ding Dong the Witch Is Dead” was astounding. And her a cappella rendering of “Skylark” (a tune some singers have difficulty delivering in tune even with accompaniment) was both a musical and a storytelling tour de force. Torme would have loved every minute of her presentation.

Laine and Dankworth, as always, were a perfectly matched pair, with her singing--especially in ballads such as “Creole Love Call”--enhanced by her sensuous sound.

Steve March Torme sang a few numbers with a stylistic verve that called up memories of his father. Peplowski and the Torme trio added some spirited improvising and the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra highlighted their brief solo portions with a pair of attractive Ellington specials--”Don’t Get Around Much Anymore” and “Take the ‘A’ Train.”