In A Sentimental Mood (SINGLE)
by MARIA PUGA LAREO
on My Keter Records
12/05/2007
Jazz/ Vocal
In A Sentimental Mood (Duke Ellington, Manny Kurtz, Irving Mills) 5:15
Maria Puga Lareo, Vocals
Frank Collett, Piano
Fernando Gelbard, Piano solo
Produced and recorded in November 2007
Recorded at: Multi Media Music, Hollywood, California,USA,
Recording Engineer: Mark Vincent
Estudios ION, Buenos Aires, Argentina,
Recording Engineer: Jorge Da Silva
Mixed by Maria Puga Lareo at: Estudios ION, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Recording Engineer: Jorge Da Silva
Mastering: Lundvall Masters, New York, USA by Kurt Lundvall
Cover Photo: Ramon Puga Lareo
Art Direction and Cover Design: Maria Puga Lareo
Produced by: Maria Puga Lareo
US Sessions supervised by Fernando Gelbard
Liner Notes: Norberto Gimelfarb (Ballaigues, Switzerland)
My Keter Records www.myketerrecords.com
Maria Puga Lareo: www.mariapugalareo.com
Myspace: www.myspace.com/mariapugalareo
My Keter Records ® X047155
In A Sentimental Mood
THE TOUCH OF GRACE
The touch of grace is all over her singing—and the accompanying piano fits exactly that touch. A brief piano intro precedes her dreamy voice singing Ellington’s 1935 “In a Sentimental Mood.” The piece is an AABA: the voice gives an airy, ethereal exposition of the two A’s and the bridge (B), then, for the third and final A, the voice's approach becomes earthier. It’s followed by a pensive and rich piano solo, before the voice resumes the final A with its earthier hue. The voice is María Puga Lareo’s, an Argentinean singer and composer who has perfect pitch and a three octave range. The pianist is actually two pianists. One of them is Frank Collett, who, besides proving again the fine artist he is, knows something about accompanying voices: he was Sarah Vaughan's and Carmen McRae's accompanist and musical director for a number of years—he also accompanied other singers not thoroughly unknown (the listing is not exhaustive): Barbra Streisand, Louis Armstrong, Sammy Davis Jr., Elvis Presley, Tom Jones, Bill Cosby, Ann-Margaret, Perry Como.
On this recording Maria and Frank seem perfectly interlaced, yet they were not together in the studio: Frank recorded his part and then Maria recorded hers. It's been done before, of course, but the results here are so amazing one listens in awe to this duet born out of today's technical possibilities and born into a singular achievement. The idea of coupling Maria's voice and Collett's piano belongs to Fernando Gelbard, an Argentinean jazz pianist, flutist, composer and producer (Phil Woods, Rob McConnell and the Boss Brass, Sam Most, Frank Collett) who supervised both recording sessions. Fernando had yet another idea: on Collett’s comping he added his own piano solo (and there you have your second pianist).
Maria Puga Lareo is also a producer—she’s the producer of this single on her own record label: My Keter Records. She started singing in 1997 and has performed in Buenos Aires, where she was born, and in the United States. Wherever she has sung, live or on TV, she has always chosen to do so in the company of the best musicians available, so that her performances would constitute a privileged jazz moment.
In Buenos Aires she has consistently sung with the best Argentinean musicians and for her debut album Body and Soul she surrounded herself with a group led and arranged by one of the best tenor players in Argentina: Enrique Varela, a living legend, who was 84 at the time of the recording—it only takes listening to him to realize how young he is! The album’s first pressing sold out and its second pressing is now distributed by the major chains of record stores and Internet music stores. An EP with four tunes from that album has been released in 2007 by My Keter Records and is being sold worldwide by Amazon®, Itunes®, Napster® and other major digital distributors. María's repertoire includes jazz standards and some of her own inspired compositions which show a solid sense of blues as well as a superb creative inspiration. Body and Soul preceded a live show, to which arrangements of new pieces by Enrique Varela, Ricardo Lew, Carlos Franzetti and Guillermo Romero were added. The CD and the show were presented at the most important jazz stages of Buenos Aires: prominent theaters and jazz clubs, as well as in the Polish, French and American embassies. Maria has sung not only in Buenos Aires, she has also performed in New York at, among other venues, the Manna Theatre accompanied by sax player Carol Sudhalter's Quartet; at the 80th Anniversary of the Sunnyside Park Foundation as guest star with the Astoria Big Band in Queens; at the “Bernice Brooks Show” on the BCAT TV Channel with bassist Bob Cunningham, former with Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie; at the Waldorf Astoria accompanied by pianist and singer Daryl Sherman. María is a member of BMI and IWJ (International Women In Jazz). She was commissioned by Fox Sports to write the signature tune and incidental music for “Límite 4x4”, a show broadcast to all the Americas.
María Puga Lareo is a beautiful jazz voice that comes from Argentina and is on it’s way to conquer the world.
Norberto Gimelfarb, Ballaigues, Switzerland, December 2007
