Adam Birnbaum Steinway Standards (2019)

This collection of solo-piano treatments of famous Cole Porter show tunes (by three different pianists, Adam Birnbaum, Jed Distler, and Simon Mulligan) presents standout Cole Porter interpretations that range from the wistful and pensive to the liltingly bouncy.

This is a music of a crushed, almost desperate, elemental lyricism, a music where an intense gravitational pull wrestles with an also elemental drive or need to survive and sing. One thinks of what life might be like on the surface of Jupiter, the so-called heavy planet — should there even be life there. Or, better yet perhaps, of the episode in the book of Genesis where Jacob wrestles all night with an angel who refuses to give Jacob his name and who, at daybreak, demands to be let go, whereupon Jacob says, “Not until you bless me,” which the angel does then do. One should add that at one point in Jacob’s night-long wrestling match with his antagonist, the mighty angel touches the socket of Jacob’s hip and throws it out of joint, whereupon, we are told, Jacob will forever walk with a limp.