Songbird

The most amazing thing about her singing, however is that no matter what type of music she sang, whether pop, soul, R&B, folk, jazz, or standards, she outsings the best of the masters in each area and does it effortlessly, simply and with no pretense. Are you listening out there, all of you graduates of the "Sam Harris(of Star Search infamy)/Mariah Carey School of Pyrotechnical Caterwauling"? Just sing from the heart, like Eva did!

Eva Cassidy has raised the bar by which vocal performance will be measured from now on. And she did it on her own terms, singing what she wanted to sing, the way she wanted to sing it. After trying to work out a deal with record execs and refusing to be pigeonholed into a certain style of music, she said "I just wanna sing. I like to do a little of everything". Eva, I just wanna listen!


A voice for the ages   February 20, 2003
hazymac (Tarpon Springs, Florida USA)
184 out of 186 found this review helpful

Like the briefest, brightest shooting star, Eva Cassidy was here, then she wasn't. Perhaps God wanted his angel back.

During a lifetime of playing and listening to all styles of music, I have heard most of the great popular and operatic singers whose work survives in recordings: Caruso, Armstrong, Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, Van Morrison, just to name a few. But I was not prepared when a friend gave me this precious album last November.

From the first bars of the first song, "Fields of Gold," you are struck by the pure natural beauty of Eva's voice, the perfect pitch, intonation, vibrato, inflection. It seems to be exactly what a woman should sound like when she sings. Your sense of awe will only build as she sings over appropriately spare arrangements (including her understated but perfect guitar and keyboard work) of pop, soul, gospel, folk, and blues standards. Impossibly, each one of her performances (some of which were live) becomes definitive.

Just for good measure, she even takes on the song of the century, "Over the Rainbow," and eclipses Judy Garland's version--doesn't just eclipse it--blows it completely away in an anthemic performance which is, believe it or not, understated. I have never heard anything like it. Listening to it never fails to bring tears. Even trying to describe it to friends who haven't heard it brings tears.

Happiest when she was on her bicycle, Eva was a shy little waif-like blonde who never thought too highly of her awesome vocal instrument. But she possessed buckets and buckets of soul without overdoing it, without oversinging (as Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion, Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, and others are known to do). I concur in all the rapturous reviews above and below. It's impossible not to love this music, just as it is impossible not to feel a strong sense of loss knowing that she's no longer with us. I defy anyone to listen to these ten songs and not be pleasantly devastated. This album will haunt you. It will hit you in your most vulnerable spot. It will become an indispensable part of your life.

(Since November I have bought the rest of her available CDs and continue to marvel at her fabulous and definitive performances. You haven't heard anyone sing "Danny Boy" until you've heard Eva sing it.)


The most beautiful voice i the world   October 30, 1999
95 out of 95 found this review helpful

Forget the calculated pop garbage of Mariah Carey. Forget the over-produced muck of Celine Dion. If you want to truly hear a beautiful voice that doesn't require over-the-top arrangements and lots of hair spray, you MUST hear Eva Cassidy.

If you first glance at the song list on the "Songbird" CD, some of the titles seem, to put it frankly, totally avoidable. "Over the Rainbow." "Wade in the Water." Songs that have been remade and remade until you may think nothing new could be added to them. Eva Cassidy was able to take these songs and turn them into something new and worthwhile. Her rendition of "Over the Rainbow" is absolutely breathtaking....moving, perfectly sung, emotional, understated. Her version of this tune perfectly captures what she was capable of...taking a song and totally making it her own.

The song choices range from traditional tunes like "Oh, I Had a Golden Thread" to contemporary numbers like Christine McVie's "Songbird." But Eva Cassidy was able to take this variety and work it to her advantage; despite the fact that "Songbird" is actually a collection of songs from three previously released albums, the performances are amazingly seamless and this makes the album as a whole a million times better than the overdone, poser pop that invades U.S. radio.

The most amazing performance here is her achingly beautiful version of Sting's "Fields of Gold." The song is made all the more poignant byt the fact that Eva Cassidy lost her battle with melanoma in 1996 at the age of 33....so when she sings "you'll remember me/when the west wind moves/among the fields of barley," it will easily bring a tear to the eye. Simply amazing.


Songs of Gold   December 22, 2005
Edwin J. Firmage (SLC, UT USA)
49 out of 49 found this review helpful

A few days ago, my daughter gave me a CD of Eva Cassidy songs. Since then I've been unable to stop listening to it. I went to the local library, checked out every one of Eva's sadly few CDs (she died at 33 before she even had a record contract), found that all were spectacular, and then bought my own copies on Amazon. Here's this mostly classical listener's verdict: Eva Cassidy is one of the finest singers I've ever heard, without regard to genre. Her voice is lyrical, her clarity on a par with that of Ella Fitgerald or Elly Ameling, her diction as perfect as Sinatra's. She has the soft sound of a popular favorite but the control and sustained power of a Lied veteran. She's also a musician of the first rank--a great arranger and a wonderful guitarist. As if that weren't enough, she has a staggering breadth, handling pop, folk, gospel, and blues with equal finesse.

If you're looking to try out just a disc or two, I recommend Songbird, Time after Time, and Imagine, in that order. Among the many beauties you'll find on Eva's discs are some that come as close as anything I've ever heard to definitive: Fields of Gold (Songbird), I Know You by Heart (Songbird), Kathy's Song (Time after Time, and yes it tops the version of the great Paul Simon himself), It Doesn't Matter Any More (Imagine), Early Morning Rain (Imagine), and Danny Boy (Imagine). Her Stormy Monday (Live at Blues Alley) is superb. To confirm my sense of just how good, I went to the iTunes store and sampled all of the nearly 120 renditions of this famous song. Couldn't find one I liked better. Topping them all is Over the Rainbow (Songbird). Judy Garland set the standard; Eva set a new one. If this doesn't reduce you to tears, see a psychologist.

Curious about the power of Harold Arlen's great song, I built an iTunes playlist of the dozen or so different versions of Over the Rainbow that I have and began comparing them. What struck me is the fact that even when the song is interpreted by an indisputably great artist such as Frank Sinatra or Ella Fitzgerald I don't get the feeling that the artist really belives in the music; it's a platform for a performance, not a trip over the rainbow. Not so with Eva. She's able to draw the listener into a world in which one can indeed travel over rainbows. This is a quality of all of her music, and a quality that distinguishes it from the work of artists who in other respects (quality of voice and technique) are her equal. Her emotion is totally invested in what is going on in the song and therefore so is ours. The mark of art at its greatest is this ability to create a secondary world of imagination and emotion, which, while we're in it, is the only place we want to be.

Why is it that such talent passes so quickly? You'll find yourself asking that as I do when you listen to Eva's hauntingly beautiful singing. Fortunately, we have these few songs at least to remember her by. After you've listened to these for hours on end as I have, you may find yourself thinking that she was singing for all of us in I Know You By Heart:

The joy you gave me lives on and on.
'Cause I know you by heart.


5 stars aren't enough...   April 10, 2002
Marites Del Campo-rodriguez (Sacramento, CA)
45 out of 45 found this review helpful

to put it simply...this album is breathtaking. When I popped it into my cd player I was just pulling out of the driveway...and then I heard her sing. I was completely blown away. Eva's voice is so pure, unique...and the way she delivers/interprets a song is just amazing. "Fields of Gold" was always a favorite song of mine...and no offense to Sting, but Eva's rendition of it really makes the words come to life. You can actually feel her emotions come pouring through with each note.

Her range is also amazing...jazz, pop, gospel...done with such ease. Her rendition of "Wade in the Water" shows her gospel prowress...but then you hear her sultry and heartwrenching "Time is a Healer" and you wonder what genre or even what generation she can't handle. And to hear her sing "Over the Rainbow" and do it justice....what a phenomenon. (Next to Judy Garland, I didn't even think was possible for someone to sing that song.)

This album is a compilation of several of her previous works. And it is unfortunate that Eva is no longer alive...but I think that her legacy will live on for a long time to come. I am so glad I took a chance and bought this cd.