Album Notes

With a rhythm section comprised of Kenny Barron (p), Ray Drummond (b), and Leroy Williams (d), Judi D. has released her debut album “Nightshade.” It is filled with wonderful moments, swings throughout and establishes Judi D. as a world-class voice with the hip, cosmopolitan undertone that characterizes New York’s deftest jazz people.-

Ted Panken


Her style borrows heavily from Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae...but there's much more to Judi D. than mere mimicry. She handles Ellington's hugely challenging "Sophisticated Lady" with just the right combination of refracted pain, misty disillusion and judgemental disdain. Her "Up Jumped Spring," superbly underlined by Wess' sax, effectively blends unexpected pleasure and thankful satisfaction. Best track: a loose-limbed "All of Me (a la King Pleasure)," that boldly displays the marvelously imaginative spirit of the unfettered Judi.-

Christopher Loudon, Jazz Times Magazine, February 2007


Judi has a strong, fluid contralto voice, with which she inhabits lyrics, making them so utterly convincing that she appears to be drawing from her own life experience. Almost as soon as the laser beam opens "Tenderly," you'll hear shades of Sarah. This is not to say Ms. D. appropriates the sound and style of either Sarah or Carmen. She is very distinctively her own incredible self. Throughout the program, her phrasing and rhythmic audacity are natural and completely in sync with her resilient supporting trio, and her interpretations and readings of "Tenderly," "Love Dance," "Sophisticated Lady," "You've Changed," and "A House Is Not A Home" are as definitive as any I've ever heard. She sings Abbey Lincoln's lyrics to Freddie Hubbard's "Up Jumped Spring" and takes obvious relish in Frank Wess' nicely Byas-ed tenor solo, which is followed by a Ray Drummond bass solo and some deliciously flowing Barron piano. "All of Me" is an absolutely faithful nod in the direction of King Pleasure's 4/14/60 recording of the same tune (based on an Illinois Jacquet solo), with the trio busily stirring Judi's vocal. And one cannot help but hear the singer's own "Small Feats" lyric as a kind of pick-yourself-up musing on her recovery from surgery (in 1995) which involved her vocal cords. You can't help but admire the honesty of the lyric "it's a small feat to stay in the game/life has ups and downs/then a twist, a turn, and then a curve..." Frank Wess plays some elegant flute on "Love Dance" and "If You Went Away," and Barron is masterful in both support and solo on "You've Changed." He is Judi's sole support on the concluding "A House Is Not A Home," and the track is a masterpiece of simpatico. The subtle support from Drummond and Williams throughout attest to their well established preeminence. In short, this is as close to a perfect Jazz vocal recital as any you'll find.-

Alan Bargebuhr, Cadence Magazine, March 2007