Tina May - Divas

Tina May is perhaps the least likely jazz singer to be calling an album Divas. No diva herself, she's one of the band, a musician as much as a singer, and while she likes to inhabit a lyric and really get inside a song, May does so with just the right weight of performance, in both French and English here. These 12 songs are mostly associated with singers of another generation, but May brings her own personality and her unfailingly attractive vocal timbre to all of them, lending You Don't Know What Love Is a lightness of touch, an insouciance almost, that takes it some way from Billie Holiday's iconic version, and singing Let's Get Lost with all the carefree romance that Chet Baker only wistfully hinted at in his version of the song, half a century or so ago.

May is also intimate and tender on Forgetful and clearly having fun with drummer-turned-assured-crooner Winston Clifford on their mischievous duet, Where You At? A cracking, crisply swinging band, superbly judged arrangements and fine soloing ensure all-round high quality. ~ Rob Adams

Personnel: Tina May – vocals; Winston Clifford – vocals; John Pearce – piano; Dave Cliff – guitar; Freddie Gavita – trumpet; Adrian Fry – trombone; Frank Griffith - tenor sax, clarinet; Bob Martin - alto saxophone; Andy Cleyndert - double bass; Bobby Worth - drums