“He has a voice that doesn’t sound like anybody else’s voice.” — Burt Bacharach
“Great songs the way they should be sung.” — Woody Allen
“He’s perfect.” — Martha Stewart
The subject of these superlatives is none other than Grammy winner Steve Tyrell who’s mounting his first-ever concert in the Philippines tonight, titled A New Standard, Steve Tyrell, at the PICC Plenary Hall during which he will serenade the audience with a repertoire consisting of mostly Burt Bacharach songs, with Frank Sinatra numbers thrown in for good measure.
“I hope to build an audience in the Philippines and I hope to come as often as I can,” Tyrell told Funfare Update yesterday at the office of Universal Records (UR) which is releasing his seventh album called Back to Bacharach.
Tyrell arrived Wednesday night from New York via L.A. From here, he will fly to Tokyo, Seoul and then Singapore which are part of his Asian concert tour.
Known for singing great American songbook songs and dishing out modern versions of old songs, Tyrell is described as “a renaissance man” who, in his four decades in the music business (as an artist, producer, songwriter, music supervisor and performer), has won awards and written songs for the industry’s greatest artists (Ray Charles, Diana Ross and Elvis Presley among them).
“I am a graduate of Bacharach University,” said Tyrell with a smile, referring to his 40-plus years of association with the songwriter he’s paying tribute to in his latest album which will be launched here to coincide with his PICC concert ahead of the US. “I saw how Burt works; he’s a perfectionist. He would do and redo his songs until he’s convinced that he has done them right. I was in the studio with him as he wrote many of his big hits. He’s a quiet man, somewhat aloof. He has been a dear, dear friend for more than 40 years.”
The 14 songs on his Back to Bacharach album are (for sure, Tyrell will sing all of them at his concert tonight: Walk On By, The Look of Love, This Guy’s in Love, One Less Bell to Answer, What the World Needs Now, Reach Out for Me, I Say a Little Prayer For You, I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself, Always Something There to Remind Me, Don’t Make Me Over, Close to You, A House is Not a Home, Alfie and Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head.
Asked what his favorite Bacharach song is, Tyrell said, “A House is Not a Home. It was the song sung by James Ingram during the memorial service for my wife Stephanie in 2003. She was also a songwriter; we worked together on the song How Do You Talk to an Angel.”
The most memorable happens to be, you must have guessed it, Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head because, Tyrell smiled wider, “it was the first Bacharach song to win an Oscar in 1970, written for the 1969 movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (starring Paul Newman and Robert Redord).”
Tonight at the PICC, not raindrops but heartwarming applause will fall on Tyrell’s head as he sings one “great songbook song” after another.
(Note: Steve Tyrell’s concert is produced by Ovation Productions. Tickets are priced at P4,200, P3,675, P2,675, P1,050 and P735. Call Ticketnet 911-5555.)
(E-mail reactions at rickylo@phil-star.net.ph or at entphilstar@ya-hoo.com)