| Jazz |
When you write about jazz, there are times when a quiet thought crosses your mind: “I should really reach out to this or that artist.” But the strange winds of promotion don’t always blow in your favor. Artists you cherish sometimes drift by, just out of reach. Meanwhile, the words pile up with each new release, and time so fleeting slips between your fingers. And then, one day, something rare happens. As if by grace, an artist you’ve long held close in your heart reaches out to you. That’s what happened with Lisa Rich.
With Long As You’re Living, Lisa Rich sings as if she were opening a window to her soul. Her voice seasoned by years of silence and song carries the listener away like a line of Paul Auster’s poetry. You hold your breath. You keep listening. You find yourself entranced by that voice gentle, luminous nestled within the deep sensitivity of Marc Copland’s piano, her faithful musical companion through all her albums. And in doing so, Lisa reminds us: yes, one can still make a love album that is intelligent, generous, and achingly beautiful in its jazz.
What moves me most is her choice of form this exposed trio that offers no hiding place, only space. Space where her voice can rise, tender and unguarded, majestic and fragile. I’ve often read reviews comparing Lisa Rich to other singers, but to me, that’s a misstep. Her voice is utterly singular. Even her scat wild and precise is as arresting as Miles Davis’s trumpet in his Bebop days.
And Long As You’re Living? It feels like a return touched by the divine.
It is her first recording since illness forced her to step away in 1991. That she returns with such elegance, such poise, deserves not just admiration, but reverence. The album, produced by Jay Clayton who left us on December 31, 2023 is dedicated to her memory. “I saw Jay perform a dozen times during her 80th year,” Lisa says. “She was a true artist, deeply inspiring someone who never let others’ opinions pull her away from her vision.”
To bring this music to life, Lisa reunited with pianist Marc Copland and bassist Drew Gress, both of whom had played on Highwire back in 1987. For one of the two sessions, trumpeter Dave Ballou joined the ensemble.“Jay and I carefully crafted a repertoire that suited this instrumentation, and everyone traveled down from New York. We recorded at Bias Studios in Virginia—the same space where I made Listen Here and Highwire. The whole album was captured in just two six-hour sessions, following a single rehearsal the day before. When the band played the intro to the first track, I couldn’t come in right away—I had tears in my eyes. I never imagined this recording would happen. It was like stepping into a dream.”
And now the dream has taken form—an album both subtle and rich, intimate yet expansive. While accessible to all, it holds within it the mark of true artistry. For me, it recalled a moment from years ago, when I was a young journalist invited to the Olympia in Paris for Yves Montand’s opening night. These are two very different artists, of course, but I felt the same hush, the same depth. The kind of artistry that leaves you changed.
The album ends like a firework blooming against the night sky precise, tender, contemporary. It brushes the edge of perfection, though we know that perfection is forever just out of reach. Behind my desk hangs a painting by a Japanese artist, and as the final notes played, I turned to look at it. Erik Satie’s Gymnopédies have always moved me. But never had I imagined hearing them sung sung in jazz. Lisa Rich made that miracle happen.
About that final piece, Lisa offers this: “To close Long As You’re Living, Haperchance Gymnopédie #1, composed by Jay Clayton, is an improvisation that slowly morphs through various forms, eventually resolving into Erik Satie’s Gymnopédie No. 1. I’d never recorded anything like it before but I loved the challenge.”
So dear Lisa, from the quiet of this page, I offer you these words, simply and with great humility: THANK YOU.
Thierry De Clemensat
Member at Jazz Journalists Association
USA correspondent for Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor for All About Jazz
Editor in chief – Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News
PARIS-MOVE, April 19th 2025
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Musicians: Lisa Rich – voice, Marc Copland – piano, Drew Gress – bass, guest: Dave Ballou – trumpet
Tracklist: Long As You’re Living, Throw It Away, When I Look In Your Eyes, New Morning Blues, Lonely Woman, Isotope, A Timeless Place, Jitterbug Waltz, Close Your Eyes, Ask Me Now, Haperchance/ Drifitng Dreaming