Rose Mallett Reflects on Dreams

Rose Mallett on the cover of her Dreams Realized album

My press release describes Rose Mallett as a “veteran jazz and soul singer;” but her latest album, Dreams Realized, was my first encounter with her work. It now has an Amazon.com Web page for an MP3 download of its eleven tracks. I must confess that I am more than a little puzzled by the title; but Mallett herself was responsible for the track entitled “Building Dreams.”

That said, I have to confess that I have never really associated the “classic” track on the album, “My Funny Valentine,” with dreams. To the contrary, I have always taken the words as an affectionate grasp of reality, rather than dreams. Indeed, that “grasp of reality” overshadows the three familiar show tunes on the album, not only “My Funny Valentine” from Babes in Arms, composed by Richard Rogers for lyrics by Lorenz Hart, but also “Feeling Good,” the joint effort of Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse for The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd, and “Send in the Clowns,” from Stephen Sondheim’s A Little Night Music. Even more to the point was the folktale that unfolds in Oscar Brown’s “The Snake,” which delivers reality at its harshest.

What struck me about Mallett’s performances was that, regardless of whether the narratives were dreams or harsh realities, she always knew how to adjust her delivery to the “message.” Yes, there are times when her stylization departs from “message.” This is most evident in Stevie Wonder’s “Creepin’.” For that matter, I never really warmed up to Barbara Streisand, making it a bit difficult for me to listen to the Yentl selection, “The Way He Makes Me Feel,” without cringing!

Dreams Realized may not be my favorite vocal album, but it still has tracks that are likely to draw me back to it in the future.