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La Blue Note è dal 1939 responsabile della compilazione del miglior catalogo jazz in circolazione. Incidere per quest'attuale costola della EMI è un vero marchio di garanzia. Non bastasse ciò, alle volte il DNA, anche quello, può garantire per un'artista. Se poi quel patrimonio genetico te lo ha passato un tale di nome Ravi Shankar, insomma, i conti tornano. E se a questo ci aggiungi tanta sana gavetta, tra accademia musicale in Texas e i locali del Greenwich Village a New York, allora si può pensare che ci sono tutti gli ingredienti per incidere dell'ottima musica. Norah Jones è tutto questo e forse anche di più.
Un talento musicale costruito nel tempo, senza bruciare le tappe. Fonda la sua band (che più tardi verrà ampliata e ribattezzata "Handsome") con il bassista Lee Alexander, il chitarrista Jesse Harris e il batterista Dianno Rieser. Nel 2001 esce "First Sessions" un EP dove compaiono sei pezzi, quattro dei quali l'anno successivo finiranno su questo album di debutto. I puristi del genere, diranno che il suo non è jazz. Molti affermeranno, con la solita puzza sotto il naso, che quest'album è colpevolmente commerciale. Lo diciamo subito, qui non siamo di fronte a Billie Holiday e nemmeno alla regina dello "Scat", Ella Fitzgerald. Siamo al cospetto di una ragazza che, con tanta fatica, è riuscita a mettere insieme una serie di pezzi di buona fattura, ad interpretare magistralmente i pezzi scritti per lei da Harris ed Alexander, e a reinterpretare, addirittura reinventare, come nel caso di "Cold, Cold Heart" di Hank Williams, le tre cover presenti nel disco. Un talento cristallino quello di Norah, udibile in tutte le tracce di un disco, che raggiunge il proprio apice in canzoni come "Don't Know Why" (scritta per lei da Jesse Harris), "Lonestar"( scritta da Lee Alexander), l'ammaliante "Nightingale" e soprattutto "Come Away with me", forse, ad oggi, il più bel pezzo mai scritto di suo pugno. Una voce suadente, "notturna" che sa essere intensa e dolce. Un disco, che è una manna per tutti i compilatori di colonne sonore da commedia romantica, perché si tratta di questo, di una raccolta di canzoni romantiche.
Non siamo al cospetto di un capolavoro del jazz (sebbene le vendite di questo disco, entrato rapidamente nella Top 40 degl'album più venduti di sempre, permetteranno ai puristi di cui sopra, di continuare a godere dell'opera della Blue Note), ma non importa; questo è un disco godibilissimo, da ascoltare di sera, magari tenendo il volume in sottofondo. Norah riesce ad emozionare, in un'epoca di fantocci costruiti ad arte per vendere, lei è il prodotto di se stessa e della sua classe, mai volgare, mai sopra le righe. La musica (può piacere o meno.....questione di gusti), con lei, è sempre al primo posto. Non ripeterà più le vette compositive di questo album, che resterà il migliore della sua decennale produzione. Ogni suo lavoro avrà come denominatore comune uno stile e un gusto assolutamente raffinato, e un'ottima conoscenza della migliore tradizione musicale nordamericana, dal jazz, al folk, passando per il blues. La sua indiscutibile preparazione la porterà a ricercare, anche in questo suo retaggio musicale, soluzioni sempre nuove (talvolta riuscite, talvolta meno). A quelle a cui basta avere un viso da copertina, gambe chilometriche e un'abbronzatura da urlo, per stare in cima alle classifiche di vendita, Norah risponde con la musica e con quella soltanto!
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
01 Don't Know Why (03:10)
I waited 'til I saw the sun?
I don't know why I didn't come
I left you by the house of fun
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come
When I saw the break of day
I wished that I could fly away
Instead of kneeling in the sand
Catching teardrops in my hand
My heart is drenched in wine
You'll be on my mind
Forever
Out across the endless sea
I would die in ecstasy
But I'll be a bag of bones
Driving down the road alone
My heart is drenched in wine
You'll be on my mind
Forever
Something has to make you run
I don't know why I didn't come
I feel as empty as a drum
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come
02 Seven Years (02:29)
Spinning, laughing, dancing to
her favorite song
A little girl with nothing wrong
Is all alone
Eyes wide open
Always hoping for the sun
And she'll sing her song to anyone
that comes along
Fragile as a leaf in autumn
Just fallin' to the ground
Without a sound
Crooked little smile on her face
Tells a tale of grace
That's all her own
Fragile as a leaf in autumn
Just fallin' to the ground
Without a sound
Spinning, laughing, dancing to
her favorite song
She's a little girl with nothing wrong
And she's all alone
A little girl with nothing wrong
And she's all alone
03 Cold Cold Heart (03:42)
I've tried so hard my dear to show that you're my every dream
Yet you're afraid each thing I do is just some evil scheme
A memory from your lonesome past keeps us so far apart
Why can't I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold cold heart
Another love before my time made your heart sad and blue
And so my heart is paying now for things I didn't do
In anger unkind words I said that make the teardrops start
Why can't I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold cold heart
There was a time when I believed that you belonged to me
But now I know your heart is shackled to a memory
The more I learn to care for you the more we drift apart
Why can't I free your doubtful mind, and melt your cold cold heart
04 Feelin' the Same Way (03:01)
The sun just slipped its note below my door
And I can't hide beneath my sheets
I've read the words before so now I know
The time has come again for me
And I'm feelin' the same way all over again
Feelin' the same way all over again
Singin' the same lines all over again
No matter how much I pretend
Another day that I can't find my head
My feet don't look like they're my own
I'll try and find the floor below to stand
And I hope I reach it once again
And I'm feelin' the same way all over again
Feelin' the same way all over again
Singin' the same lines all over again
No matter how much I pretend
So many times I wonder where I've gone
And how I found my way back in
I look around awhile for something lost
Maybe I'll find it in the end
And I'm feelin' the same way all over again
Feelin' the same way all over again
Singin' the same lines all over again
No matter how much I pretend
05 Come Away With Me (03:22)
Come away with me in the night
Come away with me
And I will write you a song
Come away with me on a bus
Come away where they can't tempt us
With their lies
And I wanna walk with you
On a cloudy day
In fields where the yellow grass grows knee-high
So won't you try to come
Come away with me and we'll kiss
On a mountain top
Come away with me
And I'll never stop loving you
I wanna wake up with the rain
Falling on a tin roof
While I'm safe there in your arms
So all I ask is for you
To come away with me in the night
Come away with me
06 Shoot the Moon (03:58)
The summer days are gone too soon
You shoot the moon
And miss completely
And now you're left to face the gloom
The empty room that once smelled sweetly
Of all the flowers you plucked if only
You knew the reason
Why you had to each be lonely
Was it just the season?
And now the fall is here again
You can't begin to give in
It's all over
When the snows come rolling through
You're rolling too with some new lover
Will you think of times you told me
That you knew the reason
Why we had to each be lonely
It was just the season
Will you think of times you told me
That you knew the reason
Why we had to each be lonely
It was just the season
07 Turn Me On (02:39)
Like a flower, waiting to bloom
Like a lightbulb in a dark room
I'm just sittin' here
Waiting for you
To come on home
and turn me on
Like the desert
Waiting for the rain
Like a school kid
Waiting for the spring
I'm just sittin' here
Waiting for you
To come on home
And turn me on
My poor heart
It's been so dark
Since you've been gone
After all you're the one who turns me off
But you're the only one who can turn me back on
My hi-fi is waiting for a new tube
My glass is waiting for some fresh ice-cubes
I'm just sittin' here
Waiting for you
To come on home
And turn me on
Turn me on
08 Lonestar (03:10)
Lonestar, where are you out tonight?
This feeling i'm trying to fight
It's dark and i think that i
Would give anything
For you to shine down on me
How far you are
I just don't know
The distance i'm willing to go
I pick up a stone that i cast to the sky
Hoping for some kind of sign.
09 I've Got to See You Again (04:17)
Lines on your face don't bother me
Down in my chair when you dance over me
I can't help myself
I've got to see you again
Late in the night when I'm all alone
And I look at the clock and I know you're not home
I can't help myself
I've got to see you again
I could almost go there
Just to watch you be seen
I could almost go there
Just to live in a dream
But no I won't go for any of those things
To not touch your skin is not why I sing
I can't help myself
I've got to see you again
I could almost go there
Just to watch you be seen
I could almost go there
Just to live in a dream
No I won't go to share you with them
But oh even though I know where you've been
I can't help myself
I've got to see you again
10 Painter Song (02:46)
If I were a painter
I would paint my reverie
If that's the only way for you to be with me
We'd be there together
Just like we used to be
Underneath the swirling skies for all to see
And I'm dreaming of a place
Where I could see your face
And I think my brush would take me there
But only....
If I were a painter
And could paint a memory
I'd climb inside the swirling skies to be with you
I'd climb inside the skies to be with you
12 Nightingale (04:12)
Nightingale
Sing us a song
Of a love that once belonged
Nightingale
Tell me your tale
Was your journey far too long?
Does it seem like I'm looking for an answer
To a question I can't ask
I don't know which way the feather falls
Or if I should blow it to the left
Nightingale
Sing us a song
Of a love that once belonged
Nightingale
Tell me your tale
Was your journey far too long?
All the voices that are spinnin' around me
Trying to tell me what to say
Can I fly right behind you
And you can take me away
...you can take me away
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