Moonglow 2020

“Moonglow” is a very forgiving song. In the many years we’ve been doing this great old 1930s jazz standard that Benny Goodman and Joe Venuti made famous, we’ve not always handled it gently — we’ve played it too fast, we’ve played it too slow, like a heavy-handed blues — and yet, class act that it is, the song has always given us something back. But it was only when Michelle Lewis took over the vocals that we truly began to appreciate the beautiful of this classic Eddie DeLange-Will Hudson composition. It’s in Michelle’s able hands that the tune unfolds like a favorite scene from a good novel. And because the song is so richly shaded, every time a new player comes into our room, “Moonglow” reveals something else about itself. For instance, on this particular take, listen to how the tune takes a light, almost spring-like turn as soon as Veezy Coffman and her tenor sax drop in with a couple of sweet choruses in last couple of minutes of recording. Here then, from a rehearsal back in February, is our 2020 rendition of “Moonglow.”