Hannah Gill - Home For The Holidays
Hannah Gill - Spooky Jazz (Self Produced, 2020) and Hannah Gill - Spooky Jazz, Vol. 2 (Turtle Bay, 2024)
Vintage vocalist Hannah Gill is home for the holidays. Only her holiday offerings are a more autumnal orange and black than a winter red and green. While no stranger to Christmas music, Gill has focused on the opener for seasonal celebration, Halloween. Gill’s All Hallows celebrations, 2020’s Spooky Jazz and the brand-spanking-new Spooky Jazz, Vol. 2 are delightful diversions from the typical holiday fare.
A solid veteran of Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox, Gill’s music is steeped in nostalgia and surprises. The singer’s Everybody Loves A Lover (2023) was her debut full-length release from the vintage Turtle Bay Records. These are modern throwbacks to the days of speakeasies and the Lost Generation given a spooky spin.
Self produced in 2020, Hannah Gill’s Spooky Jazz broke the traditional holiday release mold by concentrating on the opening of the season, rather than its close. Halloween arrives in Fall proper, when the temperatures dip and one’s favorite tipple provides a sip. The disc’s arrangements and instrumentation reveal a shade of cabaret, all music possessing a confident strut and a litany of low reeds and strings. Doris Day’s “No Moon At All” features Gabe Terracciano’s tasty violin and Jesse Elder’s sideways piano. Basil Adlam and Billy Rose’s “The House Is Haunted,” first released by Paul Whiteman and Ramona with the Park Avenue Boys on their 1934 Victor shellac. Featured here is a throbbing bass solo courtesy of Steve Whipple. Gill sings with a muscular, yet coquettish confidence, flexing her significant chops at will. Dinah Washington’s “Evil Gal Blues” provides Gill a 12-bar jump vehicle over which to vamp, featuring label mate Ricky Alexander’s taut tenor saxophone spicing things up with Terracciano and Elder’s fine period playing. Eartha Kitt’s “I Wanna Be Evil” provides Gill a perfect song on which to let her hair down.
Hannah Gill’s transition from her self-produced Spooky Jazz to her label supported Spooky Jazz, Vol. 2 is dramatic. While Hannah Gill's first self-produced recording is quite excellent, a boost in energy and freedom characterizes her label-supported second installment. Adderall-laden spooks of all orders inhabit her second installment honoring the charms of Halloween. Eartha Kitt’s “I’d Rather Be Burned As A Witch” kicks off Spooky Jazz. Vol. 2 with grand and extroverted style, one that accelerates on Dinah Washington’s "My Man’s An Undertaker.” Gill has much of her Spooky Jazz back in violinist Gabe Terracciano and reedsman Ricky Alexander. Trumpeter/trombonist Mike Davis and guitarist Justin Poindexter bring the heat to Vol. 2. Poindexter in particular plays a desperately dirty electric guitar that properly sullies “Hummin’ To Myself,” “You Hurt Me,” and “Haunted House Blues” giving each a bit of musical dread. A great surprise is Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth’s “Shine On Harvest Moon” where Gordon Webster adds an Addams Family organ in the background and Poindexter tops off his electric guitar. Gill’s genius in song choice makes these two recordings a delight.