He grew up between two songbooks — his father's, and his own generation's.
Two songbooks
Standards
The radio years
Steve grew up around these songs before he ever sang them. This is the show where he returns to them — his father's songbook, played from the original Marty Paich arrangements written for the dektette, with a ten-piece band behind him.
Family photographs and archival film move across the screen between numbers, and Steve tells the stories that go with them. Lulu's Back in Town, Mountain Greenery, The Christmas Song — the one his father wrote.
An evening that starts somewhere around Cole Porter and Johnny Mercer and ends up at Lennon/McCartney and Stevie Wonder, with a few of his own songs along the way.
Before the standards, there was the radio. Steve spent his teens on The Beatles, Simon & Garfunkel and James Taylor, and this is the night he plays them — with Michael and Jack Murphy, three voices and acoustic guitars.
March-Tormé’s voice is seductive and effortless…
A terrific set of ears and a nearly infallible sense of pitch — qualities rarer among jazz singers than one might think.
The guy is so personable, his voice so becoming and his performance so filled with élan, that he is always interesting.
Like Dad, young March-Tormé also shows great writing skills as well as strong and true vocal chops.
Dates
The artist
Steve March-Tormé has been a working singer his whole adult life. He is the first-born son of Mel Tormé — and a recording and touring artist with a long career of his own behind him.
Born in New York City and raised in Westchester County and later Beverly Hills, he grew up between two musical worlds: his father's Great American Songbook, and the Top 40 radio he turned on after Yankees games. The Four Seasons, Nat King Cole, The Temptations and — above all — The Beatles shaped his ear for harmony. Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, Todd Rundgren and Steely Dan shaped what came after.
He recorded Lucky for United Artists Records in 1977, and produced and sang on Liza Minnelli's Columbia release Tropical Nights the same year. On a recommendation from Quincy Jones, he became the solo male voice in the trio Full Swing, which recorded for Planet Records and toured Brazil and Japan.
He performs in configurations from trio to full symphony orchestra, in rooms from the Detroit Jazz Festival to the McCallum Theatre in Palm Desert and the Smith Center in Las Vegas, and internationally from London to Japan, Australia, Brazil and Canada.
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