Joni Mitchell and Jessica Molaskey are as different as night and day. Mitchell is the legendary confessional singer-songwriter who wrote poems about her life and set them to music. Molaskey is a well-known cabaret artist who often appears at New York's Cafe Carlyle when she's not performing on Broadway. Their musical styles have little if anything in common. Fans of both women might therefore be surprised by Molaskey's latest CD, a tribute to the now-retired Mitchell.
In the just-released "Portraits of Joni," Molaskey offers 14 tracks in which she puts her own unique stamp on several of Mitchell's better-known songs. Some of the tracks are as lovely as the Mitchell originals. On the deeply intimate "Both Sides Now," in which Mitchell wrote about the changes and maturity that came into her life as she got older, Molaskey sings quietly and plaintively. She's supported on this track by a simple piano back-up, and the results are quite lovely.
Other tracks might surprise listeners. In the iconic "Chelsea Morning," Mitchell recalled her salad days at the legendary Chelsea Hotel in New York, which many famous artists (and members of the Andy Warhol Factory) called home. Mitchel sang the song simply and nostalgically, with a minimum of instrumentals. Molaskey performs her rendition with a jazzier beat, combining Mitchell's lyrics with a few bars from "Aquelas Coisas Todas," a Latin jazz number performed by her husband John Pizzarelli. The result is a bizarre hybrid of Mitchell and the sound of Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66 (who did not record "ACT"), the Latin American jazz band that rose to prominence around the same time as Mitchell. Though Mitchell and Mendes both employed unique musical styles that made them rise above the rest, they don't necessarily go together. Molaskey, with her offbeat cover, might have some listeners applauding her strange melding of two different types of music. Others might not be as pleased with the unexpected combo.
Molaskey again attempts to get differing musical styles to meet in the middle when she combines Mitchell's "The Circle Game" with "Waters of March," a folk ballad by Susannah McCorkle, a few lines of which are again performed by Pizzarelli. Both songs glide in and out of each other with the kind of jazz beat one might expect during happy hour. It's Mitchell again performed in a style not necessarily suited to her unique tunes.
Fortunately, the moments of heartfelt loveliness on "Portraits of Joni" are in the majority. On one memorable track Molaskey performs the hauntingly sad "Blue," the title track from one of Mitchell's unforgettable earlier albums. As Mitchell did, Molaskey sings from her heart, weeping with her voice on a selection that might leave some listeners wiping away a tear or two.
Molaskey achieves similar heights with Mitchell's "The Last Time I Saw Richard," the songwriter's homage to her first husband and their brief marriage. As with "Blue," Molaskey searches her soul as she finds the deep emotional layers in Mitchell's lyrics, supported by a simple piano backup. What listeners get is the story of a woman as she remembers a lost love. Does she still love him?
After appearing in a dozen Broadway shows and performing in thousands of concerts, Jessica Molaskey is no slouch when it comes to singing. Her voice is strong, and her musical emotions run deep. Though she falters slightly on tracks where she tries to "update" Mitchell, most of "Portraits of Joni" is beautifully done. This CD will no doubt fascinate Molaskey's fan base, not to mention the many of us for whom Mitchell remains one of pop music's greatest and most poetic songwriters.