Sunday, May 18, 2008

Greetings:

From deep in the heart of Jersey, I am Clamchucker. The handle comes from a style of tossing (or chucking, not shucking) clamshells. It is akin to tossing a Wham-O brand flying disc. I developed the style while vacationing on Ocracoke Island, NC, where my wife and I can be found trailer camping most Septembers.

I subterraneanize the metabolically impaired for a living (undertaker), licensed in New Jersey since 1974. In addition to that in the preceding sentence, I have heard every joke on the subject — people are dying to get in . . . they have been waiting all their lives . . . business is always in the hole . . . and so on, ad infinitum, ad nauseam.

I stumbled onto YouTube while researching bossa nova music, of which I am particularly fond. Actually, my musical taste is somewhat eclectic. There are very few musical styles I do not enjoy. I have refrained from limiting my listening because I have so much invested in high fidelity sound reproduction equipment. Not that it does me much good any more. I have been stone deaf in my right ear since surgery in 1997. It is back to mono for this spring chicken.

I subscribed to YouTube after discovering Ysabella Brave. I was researching Moon River (Henry Mancini/Johnny Mercer) to see if the original Breakfast at Tiffany’s soundtrack, featuring Audrey Hepburn as vocalist, was posted. Hepburn was not a great singer. Singing was not her forte. She was smart enough, however, to make what voice she had work, and sound fairly good. Mancini, knowing her limitations, tailored the song specifically for her. Many artists, noted and not so noted, have recorded the song over the years. It became singer Andy Williams' signature song, but I had always considered Hepburn’s version to be definitive.

Of course, the soundtrack version was posted on YouTube. While scrolling through the Related Videos window, I also saw Moon River listed next to a photograph of what appeared to be some blonde floozy. “Not a chance,” I muttered. “This has to be another YouTube talentless wonder.” I moved on without further investigation.

The following evening I happened to be browsing in the same neck of the woods. This time curiosity got the better of me. “Oh, what the hell, I have to hear how bad this is.” I clicked on the floozy. Three minutes, two seconds later, I am staring at the screen in disbelief. “This deserves another listen.” From that point on I was sunk. The adage, “You cannot tell a book by its cover,” is out there for a reason. Another listen, and yet another. Stop the bus and move over, Audrey Hepburn, this is the definitive version of Moon River. I spent the next hour listening over and over again, rippling with goose-flesh.

Ysabella Brave initiates the song without fanfare, quite simply singing the lyrics. Somewhere between the eleventh and thirteenth bars, however, a transformation occurs. I describe it as “warming up.” With a turn to the camera and a slight smile, she is starting to kill. She then comes in late on “. . . rainbow’s end,” with devastating emotional effect. This sets you up for the second go-round, where she absolutely nails it. A fabulous build up, despite the enigmatic lyric “my huckleberry friend” (Mercer has stated he picked huckleberries at a river as a child, hence the lyric. It sounds hokey to me, but then again, it is an hokey lyric). Then comes the transition into the gentle let-down, “Moon River, and me.” Throughout the song (following the “warm up”) her facial expressions betray her being caught up in the lyrics. She is not just mouthing the words, as so many “performers” do today. She is fully involved. It is enough to make a grown man cry.

I called to my wife. “You have to hear this!” I played the Hepburn version, then the Ysabella Brave version for the War Department. “Not bad,” she muttered. “Not bad?” I shouted, “This is nothing short of spectacular!” Alas, my wife is no maven for music. Not that she does not appreciate it. She was raised in an “hi-fi” family, and I believe she has grown tired of listening after years of overexposure to innumerable demos. “Not bad,” is actually a favorable response in her case.

With this, I am compelled to research Ysabella Brave. I am off to Google . . . all right, over to Wikipedia . . . then the New York Times . . . okay, the Los Angeles Times . . . back to YouTube . . . yet another listen to her performing Moon River. I simply cannot believe this. Audrey Hepburn has a full orchestra, the best voice coaches, recording technicians, and sound equipment in the business. Ysabella Brave blows Audrey away with a Kodak Easy Share digital camera, a busted desk lamp, and a cheesy karaoke CD that sounds like they use an upright piano stolen from the local Board of Education!

“Well, maybe she was just lucky on this one. What else does she do?” I was somewhat new to YouTube, but I managed to find the Ysabella Brave “Channel.” “You Send Me? I am fairly confident she cannot make this work.” “Let’s Misbehave? No way” (Early jazz is one of my specialties. If you want to hear the originals, go to http://www.redhotjazz.com/, and click on “Bands.” There are over 100 early jazz bands alphabetically listed and over 1,000 tunes transcribed from original 78 rpm recordings). “The Weight? Impossible! The Band owns that song. Nobody could possibly do it as well as they.” “Don’t Know Why — Norah Jones’ signature piece — we have to stop the bus again and throw off Norah with the rest of these guys!” Norah’s slickly produced (and lip-synched) video pales when compared to Ysabella Brave, casually seated, singing soooo sweetly to the Kodak. Time after time I am blown away, shocked, stupefied, and transfixed. I cannot determine how she manages it. Just when I am certain she will be unable to make a particular song work, she proves me wrong once again.

So I joined YouTube solely for the purpose of subscribing to Ysabella Brave. I was morally obligated to support that kind of talent. She is obviously no floozy. Au contraire, she is quite the intellectual — well read and eloquent. In addition to her knock-out musical performances, she dispenses advice to the lovelorn and composes original music and lyrics. If that is not enough, she also produces scripted comedy sketches, playing multiple roles, and delivering dialogue in several dialects. All are masterfully executed using the same stone axe, flint knife, and busted desk lamp.

I find myself re-living my youth. I am a child of the 1960’s, in my teens during the decade. Music was evolving from Rock ’n’ Roll to the newer Rock formats. Musically speaking, it was a most innovative era. A lot was happening back then. I recall anxiously awaiting, along with my friends and half the world, the latest Beatles tune, Joni Mitchell song, Stevie Wonder hit, Frank Zappa creation, or Rolling Stones number to be released (among countless others). Today that same dopey kid is scanning YouTube daily for the latest from Ysabella Brave.

After 40 years, popular music has become pitifully stagnant. With the exception of Rap, Hip-Hop, and Funk (which are actually Rock variants), little has changed since the ’60’s. I find it quaint that younger generations are so enthralled with a musical form which has been languishing for 40 years. They are still listening and “grooving” to Mick Jagger, a sexagenarian for the love of Mike! I recently saw an interview of Jagger from the ’60’s, where he uttered his version of the now famous, “Do not trust anyone over thirty.” If I had professed listening to 40 year old music in the ’60’s, performed by artists in their 60’s, I would have been socially ostracized (Not that it matters, I am such a geek I am socially ostracized anyway).

As stated, I will listen to and enjoy just about anything these days. However, I am so weary of guys in tight pants, with long hair, who look like they just stepped out of Bill Graham’s Fillmore East, gyrating and contorting with electric guitars as though suffering from acute constipation. Enough already! Time for something new, folks. It is really quite tired.

That is why I find Ysabella Brave to be such a breath of fresh air. She has the versatility to perform just about any genre, no matter how technically difficult, with panache, aplomb, and most importantly, heart. American Songbook, Rock ’n’ Roll, Rock, Devotional, Classic and Contemporary Jazz, Show Tunes, original compositions and comedy sketches — multilingual and multi-dialectical to boot — there seems to be no end to her creativity. I cannot help but love it!

All right, time for this unmerciful rant to wind down, and I promise to stop hyperventilating. As you can discern by perusing my favorites list, I have also stumbled upon Zak Kim and Fretkillr, two more extraordinary YouTube talents. Like Ysabella Brave, they vary widely in their repertoire. Tune into them and you will not be disappointed.

As of this writing, Zak Kim is in the South Korean army (universal military training over there), and will be out of commission until the end of 2009. He has the unique talent of playing two electric guitars simultaneously. His rendition of J. S. Bach’s Prelude No. 3 in C Sharp Major must be seen to be believed. Even then, you still may not believe it.

Fretkillr is a technically superior, self-taught finger and flat picking acoustic guitarist with a voice to match. As of this writing, his latest release is a truly inspired version of Over the Rainbow (Harold Arlen/E. Y. “Yip” Harburg). His is one of the best performances of one of the greatest songs of the Twentieth Century. Now, if we could just get Fretkillr to accompany Ysabella Brave. . . .

Your pal,

Clamchucker

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*Photograph ©2008 Ysabella Brave, used by permission.

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