Songs More Than Melodies for Betty Carter

Is listening to the acclaimed jazz singer Betty Carter an acquired taste? Perhaps. It’s certainly true that the veteran vocalist’s very rewarding output takes more than a cursory listen to absorb.

To paraphrase the lyrics from Frank Sinatra’s anthem, Carter has always done songs her way. That sometimes means taking a song such as “Stay as Sweet as You Are,” a nice little waltz as it’s written, and turning it into an ear-grabbing number that segues from an exotic, quasi-funk mood to a slow, sultry pace. But doing things differently is what Betty Carter says she’s all about.

“The whole idea of being a jazz person is to be creative,” says Carter, 62, who appears Tuesday through Sept. 13 at Catalina Bar & Grill in Hollywood. “Do what Bird did, take the music to another level. I try to see what a tune has to offer, what kind of feeling I can get out of it that will also communicate with an audience.”

Carter, who lives in Brooklyn, has gotten into trouble with critics and some listeners for the liberties she takes--she occasionally deviates greatly from the established melodies of some songs. That’s her style, she says. “I really want people to understand that you can do them both--sing the melody and not sing it,” says Carter, who ironically titled her latest Verve Records album, “It’s Not About the Melody.” “But I’m not going to sing around the melody and not know it. I know all these melodies. If I were doing a songbook of someone’s tunes, I would sing them the way they’re supposed to be sung, but I’m not doing a songbook.”

The vocalist, who broke into the jazz business in the late ‘40s with Lionel Hampton’s band, and launched her solo career in the ‘60s, has for many years been hiring youthful rhythm sections. They give her a definite charge, she says.

“I need the energy and enthusiasm I get from young people,” says Carter, who appears at Catalina’s with three men in their 20s--Cyrus Chestnut, piano; Chris Thomas, bass, and Clarence Penn, drums. “And I get a younger audience with younger players in the band. People in their 20s and 30s, if they see young people playing this music of jazz, they can relate to it more, rather than if it’s played by four old folks. Not that they don’t relate to four old folks.”

At first, a lot of these younger musicians don’t know her repertoire, says Carter. “So many young players just listen to each other’s tunes, they don’t play standards,” she says. “So I’m not just exposing the audiences to these songs, I’m exposing my musicians.”

Rim Shots: “Just Between Us” by guitarist Norman Brown will be the first release on MoJazz, the new Motown Records jazz label that debuts this month. The line will feature a wide range of artists, including pianist Eric Reed, currently with Wynton Marsalis, multi-instrumentalist Foley, who played with Miles Davis, and drummer Norman Connors. “It really is a place where we hope artists are going to be absolutely free to express themselves,” said Steve McKeever, Motown general manager, in a press release. “We’re definitely going to test the boundaries of what people call jazz.”

Critic’s Choice: Wally Stryk is a passionate and diverse modern drummer who can work with abandon in both adventuresome, free-form modes and more structure-oriented realms. In the latter, he’s leading a trio, featuring the pianist, and gifted composer, Cecilia Coleman, on Fridays and Saturdays in September at Shilo’s in Pomona, where a new jazz policy has been instigated. The band is working from a first-class repertoire, including works by Kenny Barron, Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk as well as three solid numbers crafted by Coleman. Information: (714) 594-3575.