Dawn Derow’s Disappointing WWII Nostalgia

Dawn Derow on the cover of her debut album (courtesy of Kate Smith Promotions)

At the end of last year, Zoho Music released the debut album of vocalist Dawn Derow. The title of the recent album is My Ship: Songs from 1941, which is also the title of a cabaret show that Derow has been performing. For those unfamiliar with our country’s history, December 7, 1941 was the day on which the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked the Naval fleet of the United States at Pearl Harbor, marking our country’s entry into World War II.

Some of the selections clearly reflect that entry, such as “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree” (which is coupled with “Boogie Woogie” in a medley), and “(There'll Be Bluebirds Over) The White Cliffs of Dover.” Others reflect on what was popular, such as two Kurt Weill tunes from Lady in the Dark, “The Saga of Jenny” and “My Ship.” Unfortunately, the style of Derow’s delivery seldom reflects the spirit of any of these numbers when they were sung in 1941. Her sense of pitch tends to be a sometime thing (to appropriate the words of a song that was about half a decade old in 1941). Similarly, her approach to stylizing never quite does the trick, either in the spirit of the Forties or in terms of current listening expectations.

Those curious about jazz stylizations some 80 years ago will probably do better to consult some of the archival albums of the recordings that were made at that time.