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“Look to Your Heart: The Songs of Jimmy Van Heusen”
The Metropolitan Room – June 4, 8, 16
Listening to Marissa Mulder, I was reminded of the old Baldwin organ my father had in the 1960s, a model that had a panel of tabs beside the keyboard that you would flip to get different effects: clarinet, harpsichord, celeste. The natural timbre of Mulder’s voice is hard to pin down. The default setting seems fairly reedy, not unlike the “oboe” tab on that Baldwin. Depending on what she is singing, though, she varies the sound significantly. Occasionally, at her Metropolitan Room debut, she pulled out some surprising bells and whistles. For instance, during “Swinging on a Star”—in one “Would you like to?” line—she emitted a quick, startled-canary trill on the word “to” that was so exciting, it made me want to rewind and have another listen.
Then there’s Mulder’s “big” voice, something she used sparingly—too sparingly, in my opinion. When she moved toward a belting sound, I sat up in my chair. Suddenly, a rather ordinary-sounding voice took on much greater authority. This happened during some of the later parts of up-tempo, swinging numbers, but was most effective on “I’ll Only Miss [Him] When I Think of [Him]” (lyrics by Sammy Cahn), where the singing grew to become wonderfully full-bodied.
I admired that Mulder—directed here by Karen Oberlin—seemed truly devoted to exploring Jimmy Van Heusen’s career and music (and the lyrics of his collaborators, mostly Cahn and Johnny Burke). Many of the songs in the set were written for or have become closely associated with two male singers, Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra. They are often wistful or rueful, more about dreamy desire than happy, requited romance. (Honestly, I’ve never quite believed Sinatra when he sings about happily ever after, but I buy him totally on a song like Van Heusen and Burke’s melancholy “Here’s That Rainy Day,” which is also part of Mulder’s Met set.) Van Heusen’s unsentimental streak proves a good fit for Mulder’s voice, which is not frequently something you would describe as “sweet.” She seemed at ease with so many male-oriented songs, even teaming with musical director/pianist Bill Zeffiro to duet on the title number from the Crosby/Bob Hope picture Road to Morocco (Burke), in which she had a ball being one of the guys.
The most openly heartfelt music in Mulder’s program consisted of two songs from Van Heusen and Cahn’s musicalized 1955 TV version of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, the title number and “Look to Your Heart.” Here I was surprised again: Mulder was, in fact, able to modulate her voice to take on a more sentimental, honeyed sound.
As far as her onstage demeanor goes, Mulder could benefit from scaling things back a little. She tended to want to act the songs—even the swinging songs. That’s fine, as long as she doesn’t overact them—something she strayed into at the Met Room. She displayed an eagerness to please that resulted in passages of effusiveness, both when she sang and when she narrated. Sometimes she affected a breathy baby-doll quality—adopting frowns of consternation and looking like Shirley Temple suppressing a tantrum. During an instrumental break in “Sunday, Monday, or Always” (Burke), she closed her eyes and shook her head slowly and dramatically. I didn’t quite believe that emotive action; I sensed that the idea of sitting still made her a bit uncomfortable.
However, in the evening’s best number, Mulder was able to perform simply, without a trace of the histrionic. This was the Sinatra standard “All the Way” (Cahn), in which Zeffiro and drummer Rex Benincasa sat things out, allowing Mulder to sing against the elegant thrum of Jeff Morrow’s bass. That performance was understated and, paradoxically, thrilling. It was enough to make me pledge to keep tabs on the career of Marissa Mulder.
Mark Dundas Wood is an arts/entertainment journalist and dramaturg. He began writing reviews for BistroAwards.com in 2011. More recently he has contributed "Cabaret Setlist" articles about cabaret repertoire. Other reviews and articles have appeared in theaterscene.net and clydefitchreport.com, as well as in American Theatre and Back Stage. As a dramaturg, he has worked with New Professional Theatre and the New York Musical Theatre Festival. He is currently literary manager for Broad Horizons Theatre Company.
