Newsday du lieu suivant : New York, New York • 182

D25 KUlV rm" A iMt ffi AW' iii 7 41 usk Lilith CDs More Than Fair By Steve Knopper i a ARTISTS Fain A Celebration in Music II and (Arista) A Thoroughly Modem Louis DESPITE HIS status as one of the greatest of all American musical theater composers Harold Arlen never wrote a wholly successful show Case in point: Louis which struggled through 115 performances on Broadway in 1946 and lay dormant for the next 50 years But no ordinary flop the Bcore contains three bona fide' standards Rain or Come Place I Hang My Hat Is Had Myself a True and a host of inspired show tunes Last year the marvelous Encores! series at City Center presented a semi-staged run of Louis bringing acclaim both to the score and to the star Vanessa Williams Constructing a version of the score from scattered and incomplete source materials (a truncated original cast album piano scores found in collection) the Encores! team has done a heroic job of trying to reproduce the sound and feel of Louis original production The result is tasty stew but a trifle overrich The ramshackle libretto has been blamed for its failure But simply by listening to the album you can sense that Louis may have been just too much of a good thing lacking the simplicity and colloquialism of its more successful contemporaries The performance is strong In the title role Williams is a far less operatic (and far more mike-de-pendent) singer than Ruby Hill on the original cast album but she projects plenty of glamor reminding us that the role was originally written for Lena Horne The one weak point is Helen Goldsby peculiarly underpowered in Had Myself a True and two other prime torch numbers Lovers of musical theater owe a debt of gratitude to the Encores! forces for resurrecting this fascinating (if uneven) part of heritage And a special thanks is due to Vanessa Williams for having the clout to get Louis on disc Fred Cohn drum and keyboards McLachlan's voice is at peak sexiness As with most of her best songs the Canadian singer-songwriter thrives on ambiguity singing know who I just when you think you've figured her out That same quality though dooms her earlier duet with straightforward country singer Harris a sappy Elton John-like piano ballad unsure whether it wants to tell a story or fly around the point Naturally Arista has arranged both CDs so Lilith devotees of every niche have to buy both For folk fans for example Shawn well-written Thing is on Vol II and Suzanne Vega's '80s child-abuse hit is on Vol III Even McLachlan's two contributions are on different discs A two-CD set of new music is almost always one CD too many Neither cult veterans Cowboy Junkies From Our nor lesser-knowns Chanlal Kreviaizuk and Sixpence None the Richer do much more than replay their recordings live Singer-songwriter Lisa Loeb keeps trying to prove she's no one-hit wonder but her is almost undistinguishable from the one hit in question 1995's (I Missed You Lilith Fair still a perfect cross-section of female pop music That dream is unlikely like insisting LoIIapalooza or Ozzfest should capture every angle of male rock But it's admirably diverse and the highlights make at least one volume a worthwhile concert document Steve Knopper is a freelance writer MATTER how many rappers and hard-rockers Sarah McLachlan hires her allwoman Lilith Fair touring festival will always be associated with a certain pretty singer-songwriter style More Carole King than Joan Jett Nothing wrong with that Natalie Merchant once guilty of rendering far too precious a version of the Patti Smith-Bruce Springsteen desperation anthem the finds much more empathy with Elvis the In reverent voice awkward outsider-looking-in classic becomes the soaring hymn he always wanted it to be But instead of simply adding to pristine names Jewel Emmy-lou Harris McLachlan herself McLachlan heeded her critics The two live volumes culled from the 1998 tour document her successful quest for diversity and sometimes power The best run of the new CDs sold separately of course opens Vol Ill with funky Luscious funkier and Liz deep-voiced rocker Alanis Moris-sette copycat Tracy Bonham delivers a surprisingly strong and the Indigo Out the is a nice mixture of tough words and soft melodies McLachlan goes one for two On a swirling anthem of spacey looped VARIOUS of Women Volume Volume Ncwadqr File Sarah McLachlan Photos 1 Michael IMmonwU TITIlilTiTrrp LATIM SOUNDS LATIN SOUNDS I' A Calculated Pop Mix From Ricky By Richard Torres pose of halting sensitivity On the Diane Warren-penned ballad Stay With Martin is convincingly and heart renderingly lovelorn while on a duet with Meja he conveys romantic determination with an aching vocal rasp This album finally puts to rest the music industry myth that latino performers cannot perform credibly in English This ridiculous notion has floated around since the Julio Igiesias-WiUie Nelson duets back in the '80s Martin rocks with true verve Hopefully next time his material will be more I daring For those just arriving to the I Martin bandwagon is a fine introduction For those of us been there for awhile it'll do I for now problem with such cunning is that often the music seems more like product than art The whiff of demographic targeting permeates the disc There are the big rock ballads All I Ever and Am Made of which are tailor-made for the Z-lOOs of the world The dance-floor jam You for a with a killer hook is just a remix away from regular rotation on WKTU The music is undeniably professional but the inspiration behind it feels more mechanical than creative The one advantage does have is of course the terrific singer himself Just listen to the effortless way he drives his voice around the Morricone-meets-rockabil-ly guitar hook of Vida Martin keeps the salsa groove while infusing the song with true rock energy His soulful falsetto turns Count the into a pop confection while he swaggers with sexual vigor through the funk explosion Your As on Martin is at his best on the ballads On Careful (Cui-dado Con Mi his fine duet with Madonna he strikes the right INALLY after all the hype and hoopla comes the music By now have to be a visitor from another planet not to know who Ricky Martin is Since his galvanizing rendition of Copa de la from his album stole the show at the 41st Annual Grammy Awards earlier this year publicity machine has gone into Terminator overdrive done the talk show circuit and got labeled a by Rosie and been on Night His high-octane video for his latest single la Vida propelled the song to No 1 on pop Top 40 chart a regular on MTV and his recent in-store appearance at Tower Lincoln Center branch drew overflow crowds and coverage by the networks (Talk about la vida loca!) The latest building block in the Ricky Martin Superstar foundation is his eponymous English-language disc on Columbia Records: For the meet part written and produced by the talented AF Photo Sonidos Picks Santana and Ozomatli at Jones Beach Theater 516-221-1000 June 5 at 8 pm tickets are $4550 $3550 Rock en past present 8 and future gloriously collide in this in- 5 spired pairing Go! I Joe Cuba at 204 Varick St Manhattan 212-243-4940 Monday at 8 and 10 pm $16 The Danilo Perez Trio at Bryant Park 42nd Street and Avenue of the Americas Manhattan Thursday at 5 pm Admission: free! Richard Torres is a freelance writer Ricky Martin's latest LP adds another boost to his rapidly building popularity Robi Rosa former band-mate in Menudo and Desmond Child the album is a canny piece of pop calculation Each of the 14 cuts 10 original two redone in Spanish and two held over from previous LPs is designed to show off magnetism The.