Susan Lenzkes

Born Marion Susan Maughan but dropping her first name, Susan's big hit was a cover of Bobby's girl. Originally an American hit for Marcie Blane, Susan took the song to the top three in the British charts. Neither singer had much success after that although as I explained in a review of a Marcie Blane compilation, Marcie really wasn't interested in a recording career, or indeed a singing career of any kind, and contented herself with a normal life away from the spotlight. As a contrast, Susan has built a singing career on the strength of Bobby's girl, performing on cruise liners, at seaside resorts and elsewhere on the cabaret circuit.

Listening to the music on this two-disc set, you may wonder why the chamber works of Swedish Romantic composer Franz Berwald are not more frequently recorded. It can't be because of his themes, which are strong, sweet, and distinctive; or because of his harmonies, which are powerful, rich, and cogent; or because of his forms, which are innovative, inventive, and indestructible. The only possible reason for this music's neglect is that there's only so much room in the world for great music, and unfortunately, Berwald, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, and Dvorák have apparently already occupied all the space allocated to chamber music of the Romantic period. Still, anyone listening to the music on this two-disc set will have to wonder if there's not enough room for Berwald, too.

This album offers delightful chamber music of Giya Kancheli, regarded as one of Georgia’s greatest composers.

With a vibrant, versatile voice (sounding at times like an inspired mix of Janis Joplin and Bonnie Raitt) capable of adding subtle emotional shifts to slow-burning ballads or rocking out with the big boys, Susan Tedeschi burst on the scene at the close of the 1990s like a breath of fresh air in an era of prefab MTV teen idols. Like Raitt, Tedeschi works from a blues base, but she mixes in a strong sense of R&B and gospel, and with Back to the River, her second release for Verve Forecast, she shows that she's really starting to find herself as a songwriter, as well. Tedeschi wrote or co-wrote all but one of the 11 tracks here, and while one could still say these songs are based in her beloved blues, like Raitt, she has branched out from there to become a solid pop artist with a real and accessible vision, and the blues is just the engine under the hood. There are some wonderful moments here, including the big and funky title track, "Back to the River," which Tedeschi co-wrote with swamp pop master Tony Joe White, the sincere and solid "Learning the Hard Way," co-written with Gary Louris of the Jayhawks, and the impressive "Butterfly," which Tedeschi' co-wrote with her husband, Derek Trucks.

In this 2003 performance from the Austin City Limits series, New England's Susan Tedeschi demonstrates a range that extends well beyond her blues base. Following the blueprint employed by Bonnie Raitt a few decades earlier, she covers John Prine's "Angel from Montgomery" (a signature tune for Raitt), inserting a snippet from the Grateful Dead's "Sugaree." The piano balladry of her "Wrapped in the Arms of Another" could fit just fine on a Raitt album. The set also finds her sampling from the songbooks of Sly Stone ("You Can Make It If You Try"), Bob Dylan ("Don't Think Twice, It's All Right"), and Stevie Wonder ("Love's in Need of Love Today"), in addition to the more straightforward blues of Koko Taylor ("Voodoo Woman"). Though Tedeschi's stinging lead guitar provides the focus, she receives strong support from a band featuring the interplay of electric pianist Jason Crosby (who doubles on violin) and William Green on Hammond B-3 organ. Highlights include a tribute to jam-band inspiration Col. Bruce Hampton on "Hampmotized" and the simmering "Wait for Me," with its echoes of Aretha Franklin.

Susan Kagan, intrigued by Ries’s Op. 1 piano sonatas went on to record all 14 of his solo piano sonatas and sonatinas, gaining critical acclaim for her eloquent advocacy of these unfairly neglected yet often substantial works. Bridging the divide between the Classical style of Haydn and Mozart and the Romantic impulses of Schubert, Chopin and Mendelssohn, with a healthy dose of Beethoven often in evidence…

On her first outing in three years and her freshman offering for Verve's Forecast label, Susan Tedeschi digs deep into the soul and R&B fakebook for inspiration and comes out a winner. With an all-star band that includes guitarist Doyle Bramhall II, pianist David Palmer, organist Jebin Bruni, bassist Paul Bryan, drummer Jay Bellerose, and guests including husband Derek Trucks and the Blind Boys of Alabama, Tedeschi goes down into her own heart's well for inspiration. Wonderfully produced by Joe Henry, Hope and Desire is truly a singer's showcase of passion and class; she has signature phrasing and is an excellent interpreter.

A virtuoso pianist, Ferdinand Ries began composing piano sonatas at a time when the genre was undergoing significant changes from the models of Haydn and Mozart to new developments by Clementi, Beethoven and Hummel. Ries also pre-figures Schubert’s poignant harmonic language, Mendelssohn’s expressive sweetness and Chopin’s brilliant figurations, notably in The Dream. Opening with a stately polonaise in rondo form, Ries’s C major Sonata concludes with a thrilling perpetuum mobile finale. In his only named sonata, The Unfortunate, the influence of Beethoven’s Pathétique is apparent.

Weber’s chamber music – just these three pieces if you don’t count the duos – clearly shows him on the cusp between Classical and Romantic. The Quartet for piano and strings, written in his early twenties between 1807 and 1809, begins with a Haydnesque gracefulness and politeness which is gradually invaded by more unruly harmonies and textures; the dramatic slow movement looks ahead to Schumann, while the closing fugue of the finale dresses 18th-century procedures in 19th-century colours. Then there’s the element of virtuosity which is a hallmark of the early Romantic era, in the showy piano part of the Quartet, which Weber wrote for himself, the concerto-like clarinet part in the Quintet with strings, designed for the pioneering Heinrich Baermann, and all three parts of the tuneful Trio for flute, cello and piano. The talented members of the pan-European Gaudier Ensemble are perfectly equipped to convey these different aspects of Weber’s musical personality, with the fleet-fingered pianist Susan Tomes leading the way in the Quartet and Trio, and Richard Hosford in the Clarinet Quintet recalling contemporary descriptions of Baermann’s own effortless brilliance.