Harry Connick Jr. - Come by Me

People first smitten with Harry Connick Jr. due to his easy, timeless charm and swoon-worthy croon on the 1989 soundtrack When Harry Met Sally are in for a big treat. Come by Me, a delightful sequence of treasures both old and new, is Connick's first big-band record since 1991's Blue Light, Red Light. What's not to like? With equal precision and confidence, Connick and his 16-piece band (and at times a full symphony orchestra) move seamlessly between the boisterous self-penned title cut, the Mancini standard "Charade," and the Cole Porter gem "Love for Sale." He gives a straight and moving voice and piano take on "Danny Boy," a stepped-up freshness to "There's No Business Like Show Business," and "Cry Me a River," following his unique vision, becomes an emotionally broken Bourbon Street funereal march. Strings swell, horns wail and skronk, high hats tap time, and those magic fingers dance across the keys. All told, Come by Me is a welcome invitation. --Paige La Grone Amazon.com

Good old Harry

This is a great cd. Even my 2 and 5 year olds loves it!!! June 5, 2008

variety of style!!!

This cd is wonderfully varied in style...fast exciting jazz or slow
mornful tunes...Harry has shown off his range and that of his band.
Each listen brings new fondness of this work... March 30, 2008

Schizophrenic

A musical prodigy who studied with Ellis Marsalis and James Booker, Connick soared to fame in 1989 when movie director Rob Reiner tapped the singer-pianist to record a standards soundtrack for the romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally. Connick's fresh take on "It Had to Be You," "Don't Get Around Much Anymore," and "Where or When" drew comparisons to the young Sinatra during his years with Tommy Dorsey. After composing and performing a promising album of big-band melodies, We Are in Love (1990), by decade's end Connick recorded Come by Me, a much more mature and ambitious work.

However, it's also a more uneven work. Come by Me is simultaneously Connick's best and worst album. To fully enjoy it, it's best to have an Ampex reel-to-reel tape deck, a good pair of demagnetized scissors, and lots of splicing tape.

Connick begins with a great title track, a composition from his own pen that starts off jaunty with a small combo and builds to full-out big-band swing. Come by Me shows him at his most innovative: great romantic lyrics set to a rousing and robust arrangement. He follows up with an off-the-beat version of Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer's "Charade," which captures the simultaneous thrill and despair of the original.

After that, though, the album just falls apart. He opens a high-swinging "Time After Time" with a gratuitous, heavy-handed interlude that tries hard (but fails) to sound like Thelonious Monk, is longer than the song itself, and finally propels me to the kitchen to microwave a TV dinner. His "Danny Boy" is so slow and overwrought that it makes Chopin's "Funeral Sonata" sound like the "Minute Waltz." There's a ridiculous instrumental, "Next Door Blues," that tries to blend Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington with jazz/funk fusion. It comes off as tasty as a peanut-butter-and-mustard sandwich.

Connick's music is the standards sent to finishing school. Yet great jazz doesn't come from music theory class, but rather from the school of hard knocks. The other problem with Connick's more recent work is that he seems to have bought all the marketing hype about his being "the next Frank Sinatra." Perhaps when he discovers that he's the first Harry Connick, Jr., his music will fulfill the promise of his early efforts. June 5, 2007

Swings.

One reviewer (Josh Feldman) believes that Coltrane, Miles, and Monk have some sort of universal license on "jazz". Never mind all that came before them!

This album really swings. On "Love For Sale" and "Time After Time", you will hear not just another singer, but the sort of signature expression we've come to expect from Harry Connick Jr. I highly recommend this recording to anyone who enjoys this genre of music!
January 10, 2007

Pretty average Connick release

Many of his fans cringed at the experimentalism of STAR TURTLE and SHE. Unfortunately, I think their relief at Connick's return to the big-band style of WHEN HARRY MET SALLY, WE ARE IN LOVE, and Blue Light, Red Light is making them a bit too effusive in their praise for this album.

Simply put, there are less outright stinkers than on many of his other releases post-RLBL but also fewer standouts. Too often Connick visits off-trod ground without really offering anything new to the song.

HIGHLIGHTS:
"Come by Me" deserves the title nod as the Connick composition ends up being one of the more involving ones here, owing to an arrangement that starts small (barrelhouse Nawlins piano boogie) before swelling to full-stop big band at the end. It also has the lyrical tone of the 'sly wink' that usually suits Connick best. (Think of "You Didn't Know Me When" from RED LIGHT, BLUE LIGHT). "Next Door Blues" is a sore thumb in the context of the album: out and out bluesy organ driven funk. There's no denying, though, that it's one of the more spirited (and musically interesting) cuts. "Cry me a River" doesn't surpass the (definitive) Julie London rendition but it is impassioned and makes for a nice listen.

LOWS:
"Danny Boy", as others have noted, is painfully slow. I also thought the melancholy air of "There's No Business Like Show Business" completely was at odds with the tune's central theme: all of us regular Joes and Janes are jealous of celebs and would take their place in a moment. Connick's lackadaisical tempo makes it sound like it's all drudgery.

BOTTOM LINE:
Those who like big-band Harry MAY enjoy this, but I feel it's too uneven to give a hearty recommendation. Definitely listen to the samples..or better yet borrow a friend's copy..before taking the plunge to buy. November 13, 2005

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