The world made its acquaintance with quirky young attorney Ally
\nMcBeal and soulful singer-songwriter Vonda Shepard at almost the
\nsame instant.<\/p>\n
During one of the still, charged interludes early in the pilot
\nfor this TV season’s “It” show, as Ally broods, a piano takes up a
\nsoft, purposeful melody in the background, marking and framing the
\nmoment to perfection. Gradually, the piano is joined by a gently
\nascending chant from a remarkable female voice. The chant is
\ndeceptively simple – “La la la LA la la la la”- but the range of
\nfeeling conveyed in its steady rise and fall is fairly astounding.
\nMelancholy, grit, vulnerability, hard-earned wisdom… Vonda
\nShepard packs more emotional evidence into her vocal interpretation
\nof these eight “la”s than most heavy metal screamers cram into
\nhundred-minute double albums.<\/p>\n
The snippet is from the song “Maryland,” the captivating
\nlead-off from Shepard’s 1996 album
\nIt’s Good Eve<\/i>, and hearing it, you’re left wondering how
\nsomeone with such an obvious gift could really have spent the
\nbetter part of the last fifteen years beating on the doors of
\nsuccess and not getting an answer (the album is her third, on her
\nsecond label, in eight years). The singer-songwriter’s best pre-
\nAlly<\/i> gig was singing back-up and opening for Jackson Browne
\non his ’96 tour, which isn’t bad until you consider she’s his equal
\nas a composer and his superior in front of a microphone.<\/p>\n
Shepard is something of a vocal athlete whose home field
\nadvantage is clearly a quiet smoky L.A. bar late in the evening. At
\nleast, that’s where rumor has it that
\nAlly<\/i> creator\/executive producer David Kelley’s wife Michelle
\nPfeiffer “discovered” her. As a result, she is now playing a kind
\nof mirror-game with reality, getting regular air time on the show
\nas the house singer in the bar where “Ally”‘s cast of attorneys
\nhangs out after hours, singing her own tunes and a passel of
\nfamiliar covers, some of which likely date from her own club act.
\n(The irony, of course, is that her portrayal of a nightclub singer
\non a successful TV show has undoubtedly propelled her into the
\nmedium-sized theater category already.)<\/p>\n
Shepard’s specialty – other than a tone-shifting vibrato that’s
\nremarkably evocative when not overused – is the sharply realized,
\neven raw slice of romantic life. On songs like “A Lucky Life,”
\n“Like a Hemisphere” and “Hotel Room View” she matches strong piano
\nand acoustic guitar melodies with knowing observations that cut
\njust the right stance to act as a sort of on-screen Greek chorus to
\nthe perpetually flustered McBeal. “Grain of Sand” is equally
\nobservant and quite interesting musically, with its distinctly
\npsychedelic vocal ascensions and swirls.<\/p>\n
“Maryland” is where her gift shines the brightest, though, as
\nshe crafts a starkly honest look at her own pre-“Ally” life or
\nsomething very much like it: “Never worry about what I did wrong \/
\nAnd that I’ll never be what my daddy wanted me to be \/ And I’ll
\nnever see what my mama’s dreams were \/ But I will sing…”<\/p>\n
It’s been a long struggle for Vonda Shepard, but one that serves
\nher well as she plays the voice of the wise older sister to the
\ndazed-and-confused Ally. And when the
\nAlly McBeal<\/i> soundtrack comes out later this spring, it’ll
\nearn her a well-deserved hit album, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5928],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-35879","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-vonda-shepard","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35879"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=35879"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=35879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}