Last year, when the jazz singer Karrin Allyson released "Wild for You" (Concord), an album of 1970's soft-rock songs filtered through a jazz sensibility, musical worlds that usually brush elbows without pausing to talk stopped to engage in a deep conversation. They found much in common. The dialogue revealed, among other things, that songs by the likes of Joni Mitchell, James Taylor and Carole King, when taken away from their creators, can blossom in the hands of a sympathetic jazz interpreter. Had Ms. Allyson followed a different path, she might have enjoyed a pop career along the lines of Bonnie Raitt's or Shawn Colvin's.
Four songs from that album were included in Ms. Allyson's opening-night show on Wednesday at Birdland, where she is appearing through tonight with a group that includes George Mesterhazy on piano, Todd Strait on drums and Bob Bowman on bass.
Ms. Mitchell's "All I Want" was fortified by a tricky piano-and-percussion arrangement that silhouetted its nervous melody. Lifted out of its acoustic groove, Mr. Taylor's "Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight" emerged as a classic torch song.
These songs were only one ingredient in a set that featured the lyrics of Chris Caswell to jazz melodies by Nat Adderley ("Teaneck, N.J." and "Never Say Yes"), Dizzy Gillespie ("Con Alma") and Hank Mobley ("The Turnaround"). Songs by Caetano Veloso, Oscar Brown Jr., Bobby Timmons and Jon Hendricks, and classic pop (Mack Gordon and Harry Warren's "I Wish I Knew") rounded out the low-keyed set.
A no-frills singer with a feline touch and impeccable intonation, Ms. Allyson is an interpreter who cuts to the chase, but with minimal psychodrama.
When improvising, her light, graceful scatting draws out the meaning and the feeling of a song without a trace of ostentation. Taking over the piano, she displays the same ease and fluency. All the while, she remains comfortable and alert in her musical skin. Songs, flowing like tidewater under a bridge, are observed with keen, steady insight and philosophic acceptance.
Karrin Allyson concludes her run tonight at 9 and 11 at Birdland, 315 West 44th Street, Clinton; (212) 581-3080.
By STEPHEN HOLDEN nytimes.com
Technorati tag: Jazz
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