“Playing with this many great musicians gives me so many more colors to play with, and I have so many more colors in my crayon box.  I have a lot of fun with this horn section and the percussionist. I am really having a good time,” says the supremely talented jazz vocalist Amy London in talking about her new album When I Look In Your Eyes.

The CD opens with London powerfully and emotively singing the swinging, Ira and George Gershwin tune “There’s A Boat That’s Leavin’ Soon.” London’s studio performance is energetic, and presents the listener with a very live concert experience. The artists, to whom she was referring earlier, also turn in a wonderful performance, as they create a big band, full orchestral feel, despite the fact that this was a nine-piece ensemble. For this recording, London used two different pianists, John Hicks, and Lee Musiker, her husband Roni Ben-Hur, on guitar, one of music’s top bassists Rufus Reid, drummer Leroy Williams, percussionist Steve Kroon, Richie Vitale on trumpet, Chris Byars who tripled on tenor and alto saxophone as well as the flute, Dan Greenblatt doubling on tenor and soprano saxophone and trombonist John Mosca.

“At a certain point, about five years into my experience singing in clubs in New York, I realized that I wanted to try to aim for live performances that were recording worthy, and vice versa, recordings that were as much like a live performance as possible. “Being in the moment,” became a clear process for me, and the means through which I would work to achieve this goal,” says London.

As for her CD When I Look In Your Eyes, London says, “Essentially, it was recorded live. We were all in booths in the studio, but there was very little overdubbing, and a lot of it was first or second takes. Generally speaking, when I go into the studio, I am a first take kind of a girl. In my opinion if you keep doing it over and over again, trying to fix mistakes, it just keeps getting worse. I prefer the freshness of the first take. I like the spontaneity of it. Bennett Studios is a really wonderful place and the engineer Dave Kowalski, is a dream engineer. He has good ears and he is a super nice guy. He knows exactly what to do to make you feel comfortable.” 

There are other reasons that the album comes off with such a big band sound, and Amy London likes to give credit to Chris Byars who wrote seven of the arrangements for the record. Her friendship with Byars dates back to the year 2000, when Byars hired London to be the vocalist for his little big band.

“Chris can write for anything. He can write for a symphony, a big band, or he can write for six, five or three horns. Chris carries a lot of Ted Dameron with him, and he is also a big Elmo Hope fan. He is in the same ballpark as I am artistically,” she says.

It is however, with songs such as “Wonderful, Wonderful,” that something else becomes immediately apparent about Amy London’s vocal presentation, and that is her ability to create the sense for the listener that you are in the front row listening to a Broadway production.  That illusion is not accidental, for she spent three years as a member of the cast for the Cy Coleman’s (music) / David Zippel’s (lyrics) Broadway musical, City Of Angels, based on the book by Larry Gelbart. City of Angels was the recipient of five Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Score. London’s vocals appear on the Columbia Records soundtrack for the musical.