Reviews of Foolish Heart

“I defy anyone not to be charmed by the subtleties of her voice”—John Chalk, The Cinnamon Club

“…mercurial talent”—Wigan International Jazz Festival 

“A rich powerful voice that possesses an almost lonely haunting quality”—Sheffield Jazz & Swing Festival

“An attractive album with some excellent standards”—Jazz Rag

“Backed by superb musicians (Sally Doherty’s) talent cannot be expressed in simply a few words… blessed with a voice (that is) supple soft and strong, sensuous and melodic. In short: Sally is one of the brightest talents on the current music scene. ‘Foolish heart’ is a gift for those lovers of good music.”—Jazz & Bossa Nova, FM-106, Rio de Janeiro

“Sally Doherty’s bow is a many stringed thing, and that bow is her voice. She seems to sing as easily as most of us breathe… this album is quality and her phrasing and intonation are exquisite throughout.”—Sandman Magazine

“An attractively soft voice and a low key approach to her repertoire that admirably suits the material”—Jazz Journal

“Her voice cuts through and delivers every emotion required… divine singing”—The Cinnamon Times

“Piero Tucci is a jazzer’s dream… unpretentiously skilful’—Sandman magazine

“It was in 1949, when Mark Robson’s ‘My Foolish Heart’ flickered over American cinema screens. A typical Hollywood romance, kitschy and sugary, yet the title song from Victor Young remained unforgettable till today.

Revived by a voice, we all should be familiar with, this and other jazz ballads send the listener on a trip back into the late fifties. A time, when men still wore hats, New York’s bars were filled with a piano-soaked Cool Jazz mood, whilst with the Bossa Nova literally speaking splashed over a new wave of musical expression from South America.

Three years after the highly acclaimed release of her folk adoptions (‘Black is the Colour’) Sally Doherty ventures into exactly this atmosphere, a charming mixture of nocturnally dropped blues rhythms and Latin temperament. The songs she chose for this purpose are altogether legendary and now absolute classics of the genre, thinking of ‘Cuando vuelva a tu lado’ (‘What a difference a day makes‘) or ‘Bésame mucho’ that became worldwide hits. About every single one of them there surely could be told an own and personal story, which hopefully gets a word in elsewhere and by a more competent writer. The background is always woven by passions, romantics, faltered and failed love and Sally Doherty does well understand how to extract the emotional content of these songs with an intuitive accentuation. Her crystal-clear voice that dews down softly and warm on the music in English, Spanish and Portuguese performs now melancholic now sensual, erotic and sometimes also careless and playful. It almost seems as she had never sung something else than Jazz.

Three virtuoso musicians accompany her sensibly and let the songs appear in an original and genuine image by bass, drums and piano. Only the Spanish ‘Historia de un amor’ sticks out of the rest with accordion and a bit of a rustic folk hint. Without doubt, all of the intonations on this album are just timeless, and in double respect: by extravagant and digressed improvisations the compositions stretch extensively and leave the listener always deeply immersed in their rhythms. You really have to nail your feet to the floor, but even this won’t help to stop them from swinging to the tune of ‘Softly as in a morning sunrise’ on which Sally’s vocals hover as lightly as a feather and very gently, slightly perceptible touching the throbbing bass strings. But again with a slow piano ballad like ‘The night we called it a day’ it makes you feel the whole weight on the ground of a sensation. These are the constantly changing stirrings of a foolish heart in love, which create the dynamics and the atmosphere for this collection of songs.

Sally Doherty proves very well that she can use her voice in many different ways, permanently gaining new facets. With the latin/jazz project she’s been on tour since last year and so the quartet’s debut was long overdue and indicates a much promising future, for ‘Foolish Heart’ is a just wonderful, professionally recorded, nostalgic album for warm summer nights and lovers of ‘Orfeu Negro’ and smoky bar music.”—Roy Liebscher for www.lichttaufe.com, Germany, 2005

<< go back or jump to another album