Fabulous Dead People | Frances Faye

By CHRISTOPHER PETKANAS

| July 12, 2010, 3:50 pm

Collection of Tyler Alpern

In the late 1950s, the cabaret scene on the Sunset Strip was so feverish, you could hear Christine Jorgensen and Frances Faye in different rooms on the same night without leaving the building. Jorgensen played the Interlude; Faye the Crescendo downstairs. Jorgensen’s set included “I Enjoy Being a Girl,” sung, apparently, without irony. A robust performer even on a bad day, Faye could be heard through the floorboards, violently slapping the piano keys and inquiring, “Gay, gay, gay, is there another way?”

Frances Faye was that rare thing, a white chick who could not only shout but swing. She had a dry, gruff voice she put in the service of a deadpan, declamatory style, nudging listeners to consider standards in a different way: stripped of obvious sentiment. Is Faye’s brash recording of “Am I Blue” the most knowing version on the books? People who thought Teddi King and Mildred Bailey and Felicia Sanders said it all have concluded “yes.”

Faye made more than a dozen albums, collaborating with the aristocrats of pop-jazz arrangers, Dave Cavanaugh, Marty Paich and Russ Garcia, and musicians like Maynard Ferguson and Herbie Mann. Faye was partial to a Latin beat, and Jack Costanzo, the great bongoist, often supplied it.

If you own nothing of Faye’s, “Caught in the Act” is a good place to start. So is Terese Genecco, who performs songs identified with Faye at the New York club Iridium. Please don’t stop reading. Genecco is no dumb tribute act. She does not want to be Frances Faye; she does make you understand why she’s so important. With Nick Christo it’s more the other way around. Christo is an Australian singer whose entire show is devoted to Faye. His chirpy, wide-eyed approach is at odds with her material. Also, he’s not a girl.

Collection of Tyler Alpern

Faye’s music and sexual identity were inseparable. She had been married twice when, in the mid-’50s, she met Teri Shepherd, who was some 20 years her junior and became her manager. As Shepherd tells Bruce Weber in his film “The Chop Suey Club,” she and Faye were a couple for 31 years when Frances died in 1991 at age 79. (Shepherd still has the house they shared in the Hollywood Hills.) Onstage, Faye — one of Weber’s all-time heroes — mischievously changed “him” to “her” when singing love songs and peppered her sets with L.L.J. (Lite Lesbian Jokes). “That’s why I never go with girls,” she’d say when a woman hollered from ringside. “They’re so aggressive when they’re drinking.” The gays loved Fraaahncis. They still do.

For Faye’s longtime fans as well as those new to the party, all roads lead to Tyler Alpern, 45, of Boulder, Colo. Alpern began listening to Faye in 1988 but was frustrated by the lack of information about her. Ten years later he found a mention in a biography of Peter Allen. Since then, Alpern has traced Faye’s life in a rambling essay that runs to more than 18,000 words on his Web site, though if you dig deep you will also find some adamant score-settling: “I keep reading that although a top-notch entertainer, Frances Faye ‘did not have a great voice.’ I disagree!” As there is no biography of Faye, Alpern’s site will have to do.

If you knew nothing of Frances Faye, saw a clip and thought, That woman could only be from Brooklyn, like Fanny Brice could only be from Brooklyn, you’d be correct. Faye’s mother was a Russian immigrant, her father an electrician and arsonist familiar with Sing Sing. David Daniel Kaminsky — Danny Kaye — was a second cousin. Faye scored her first gig at 15, quit school and before she was 20 played the Cotton Club and speakeasies like the Calais Club. Gangsters, including Al Capone, adored her, some paying $1,000 a pop for requests. Discounts were neither demanded nor offered. Eight thousand dollars bought “Love for Sale” eight times. Faye was so at home with goons, she wed one, Abe Frosch, who did time for running a gambling syndicate. Her second marriage, to Sam Farkas, who had been a professional footballer, got off to a bad start. Faye was “broken to bits,” Alpern says, in a car accident on their honeymoon. Also, Farkas beat her.

Splitting the bill with Bing Crosby at the Paramount on Broadway in 1932 led to Faye’s first movie, “Double or Nothing,” which starred Crosby, and to her first record deal, with his Decca label. Visually it was hard to know what to do with Faye in that era. She wasn’t thin, and the camera did not love her nose, which was never small. (Faye went on to make her appearance part of her shtick, with flip deprecations like “I think when you’re pretty it doesn’t matter how you wear your hair.”) All of 24 in “Double or Nothing,” Faye doesn’t look a minute under 50. She wasn’t so much costumed as slipcovered. Playing a nightclub performer, she has one delirious scene in the film. For nearly five minutes, she and Martha Raye engage in a barkfest, scatting their brains out, two aliens from planet Zazz Zu Zazz.

Collection of Tyler Alpern

The ’30s were also Faye’s big years on West 52nd Street, where she shuttled between the Hickory House, Club 18 and Leon and Eddie’s. Back on Broadway in 1943 in “Artists and Models,” she was joined for one big number by four female jazz harpists. (Not the novelty it sounds: Daphne Hellman made her debut at Town Hall around the same time.) In about 1950, fed up with orchid corsages and portrait necklines, she scalped her hair and dyed it blond, earning an attack from Leonard Feather in Downbeat when Capitol Records signed her. “After studying the physical characteristics of typical recording stars,” he wrote, “… you wouldn’t be likely to pick … a matronly looking woman with a Brooklyn birth certificate, arthritis, a tough vocabulary, a quarter of a century in show business and hardly any records at all. …” Feather later tried to make it up to her by crowning Faye “the consummate nightclub performer.” Which she was.

In 1958, Faye tripped on the carpet in a Las Vegas hotel room, broke her hip and walked with crutches or a cane for eight years. Still, she worked. She’d be carried to the piano with the lights down and discovered by the audience when they went up. She was out of hope when a third hip operation proved successful. In 1977, parts of her act were filmed for “Alexander: The Other Side of Dawn,” a TV movie about gay runaways, and before retiring in 1981, she was cast as the madam in Louis Malle’s “Pretty Baby.” A series of strokes that silenced Faye seemed especially cruel.

For Nick Christo, Frances was “like a sequined piece of driftwood.” But to quote the lady herself, “Does that sound too camp?” Having floated a fragment of music ripe with innuendo, it was the question she often asked just before leaving the stage. The way she framed it, it sounded aspirational.

Review: Under The Covers - Terese Genecco sings Elvis Presley! Tweet this article !

By Elli - The King of Broadway

As a part of Under The Covers, the New York Nightlife Award winning series produced by Lennie Watts, Terese Genecco sings this ground-breaking album from start to finish, in a groundbreaking live performance, accompanied by Musical Director Sean Harkness on the guitar! From the lilting blues – ballad arrangement of "Blue Suede Shoes" to the rocking "Just Because," Ms. Genecco presents Elvis' self-titled first album, Elvis Presley (recorded in 1954, 1955 and 1956), track by track, with a twist – every song is sung to a different beat than the original. I warn you, this is not your mother's Elvis. Ms. Genecco conceived and arranged the show with the always amazing Sean Harkness. As a result, we are treated to a tone-poem version of "Blue Moon" and a slow jazz cover of "Tutti Fruiti." Add to the mix a blues guitar arrangement of "Heartbreak Hotel" (from the 1999 reissue with extra tracks), pepper the sauce with behind the scenes anecdotes of Elvis' personal life (Mama walked him to school every morning and walked him home every afternoon) and stories of the people he encountered along the way, and how these songs came to be included on this album, and you have a perfect evening Under The Covers. Full of unexpected rhythms, later in the evening Mr. Harkness treats us to a wonderful guitar solo of "I Want You, I Need You, I Love You" (also from the 1999 release), and Ms. Genecco ended the evening with a rousing rendition of "Viva Las Vegas," with the entire audience singing along. Whether you are a devout Elvis fan, or a devout Terese Genecco fan, or both, this is a great show not to be missed

	Terese Genecco Sings Elvis Preseley Don't Tell Mama New York, NY
Surprise! Terese Genecco, who has made a name for herself as the very good good-time gal with the big band, bigger belt, biggest sassy-strut personality in town can do small. With just her band’s invaluable guitarist, Sean Harkness for musical accompaniment, she shows her sensitive and rootsy sides as the two re-imagine all the songs from Elvis Presley’s first album. Pre-icon status, Elvis’s material was eclectic and proves to be quite adaptable to adventurous re-shaping by this creative, magnetic pair. Her just-for-the-occasion jacket was bright white but her voice revealed new colors in the plaintive, moody and relaxed, simple country numbers. Playful with smaller-sized “Blue Suede Shoes,” they were in step with the audience’s anticipation of the more slowly-unspooled lyrics. They humanize the legend by doting on anecdotes revealing his insecurities, maternal attachment and missed opportunities (narration needs tightening but is interesting). Nailing songs like “Got a Woman,” we’ve got a woman capable of making us see Presley in a new, warm light. Guitarist Harkness, a gentle spirit and masterful player/arranger, is a true partner in the presentation. Some might have expected/wanted more assertive, carefree styles associated with classic Elvis (and “classic Genecco” whose monthly Iridium shows are packed with Rat Pack raucousness). Sure, they might add a couple of rockers, especially if they break out from the Under the Covers series concept’s assignment of doing one single album’s cuts from start to finish, but talented Terese’s stretch succeeds and delivers—with no stretch marks! Rob Lester Cabaret Scenes March 29, 2010 www.cabaretscenes.org

Terese Genecco: One Year and Counting!
By: Rob Lester

There’s a meeting for hopeless addicts that happens once a month on 51st Street and Broadway, as those souls who need their fix descend a narrow stair to a dark basement room. Huddling there by the glow of a blue sign, they can be seen shaking and howling with others who share the habit they can’t quit. “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” can be heard in the air, and all commiserate. That habit is attending the blazing musical performances of a dynamo named Terese Genecco and her band whose high-powered act and the happiness conveyed by them creates the desire to have more, more, more and they return, return, return, some staying for the early show and the late show. “Infectious energy” would be putting it mildly – it does get “under your skin,” with the drug of choice being pulse-quickening music.

There are blaring horns, wild bongos and more, playing socko arrangements as Terese belts, wails, struts, swings, jokes and rocks the room in a way that makes her audiences willing victims of her seductive steamroller style. The aforementioned shaking is the Genecco-generated genuinely joyful jumping around, and the howling is whooping and cheering that comes with the applause and grinning. It’s easy to see why she has a following, especially as it’s never the same old same old, since she’s also introducing new numbers, guest performers, and when she does her commanding command performance on the last Tuesday of each month, the first and second set are totally different. No wonder she keeps getting held over, celebrates the first-year anniversary mark on March 30, and was voted as the Outstanding Female Vocalist by MAC, the Manhattan Association of Cabarets and Clubs, and also won a Bistro Award.

This Tuesday, her one-year anniversary celebration at the Iridium will feature special guest Mark Winkler, the jazzy and wry singer and songwriter. Expect from Terese some slyness and sass, some samples of standards infused with quicksilver jazz and swing with her great band. Sets can be packed with Rat Pack punch, such as the zippy “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head,” and songs plucked from her repertoire of numbers tailored for her idol, the sassy and irrepressible night club entertainer Frances Faye. Her tribute show to Faye was a hit and, recorded live, became her first CD. References to that project on the internet have caused some Faye fans to stumble upon her and become Genecco fans, too. Terese has also recently acquired some orchestrations that began in the hands of Frank Sinatra. Not bad. Recent collaborators have included drummer/ bandleader Mike Berkowitz, who also works with another Genecco idol, Liza Minnelli. She likes the lady’s gene pool, too, with some Judy Garland in her musical cocktail mix along with some Sammy Davis, Jr. Sometimes, much more than some --- like borrowing his thrilling medley from West Side Story with just percussion accompaniment. With her band, she’s saucy and bossy (in a winking way) as she asks them in solos to play a “crazy” lick or drum roll or, “Go really, really low and then really, really high.” Or is it those rabid, cheering fans who get crazy and really, really high on all this high-flying crazy rhythm? It should be stressed that she doesn’t copy the vocal sounds of any of these singers, she just walks around or stomps around in their footprints or basic blueprints of their great arrangements.

Her specially-written revamp of “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,” created for the MAC Awards show, has been kept in her repertoire as microwaved Motown magic. Her latest identity theft is a show of Elvis Presley’s songs, working with just guitarist supreme Sean Harkness, whom she has also so wisely kidnapped to be part of her Iridium band.

Not one to be content to rest on her laurels or ever phoning anything in (quite the opposite indeed!!), Terese is always looking for new ideas, new songs, new musicians, new guests and new ways to network and get work. When a regular musician is not available one Tuesday, she loves working in someone new and rehearsing with him, seeing how the new person brings a new flavor and personality to the family. And she’s welcoming and friendly as she works at winning over first-time audience members who might be tourists who wandered in out of curiosity while strolling along Broadway or were brought by a friend who is a returnee. And the addiction grows. Check it out. Come to a meeting.

My name is Rob and I am a Geneccoholic.

***IN ADDITION***

And just today, it was announced at a MAC press conference that Terese Genecco has been nominated for another MAC Award, particularly notable because her visibility and success have caused her to be re-categorized in the Major Artist field.

"If you don't know Terese Genecco, you should. She's a pint-sized dynamo...vivacious, funny and gifted with the need to swing in a big, bold way. It's a gloomy world out there, but with Terese Genecco and her Little Big Band in the house, it's a WHOLE LOT BRIGHTER!"