By Michael Portantiere***Is it possible to take for granted a 98-year-old singer who consistently performs with all the vocal power, energy and stamina of somebody one-third her age? The answer, on the face of it, would seem to be an emphatic “NO!!!” Yet the amazing Marilyn Maye continues to shine so frequently and so magnificently in clubs and other venues around the country that there might be times when her most ardent followers—and you can count this reviewer among them—momentarily forget how wondrous it is that she can still do this sort of thing so very well, when 
most other humans who make it within reach of their centenary year are not even ambulatory.
The latest exhibit of Maye’s mastery was her recent concert in Provincetown, MA. Occasional, brief memory lapses were treated lightly by the singer and her musicians and were forgotten by the audience seconds after they happened, leaving us to revel in the brilliance of Maye’s undiminished talent and glittering showmanship.
The lady’s patter between songs is always delicious. (I’m convinced that, if she hadn’t been so greatly gifted as a singer, she might have had a successful career as a stand-up comic.) In the midst of the Provincetown concert, she recounted how she began vacationing in that gay mecca at the tip of Cape Cod some 17 years ago. Maye visited annually two or three times, taking in some of the town’s famous drag shows, before it occurred to her that she might perform there herself. She brought the idea to her lawyer and confidant, Mark Sendroff, who responded: “Marilyn, they just want drag queens.” (At this point in the story, Maye pointed to her spangly dress, as if to indicate that she qualifies.) Anyway, she was booked at the Art House—initially for a brief fun, to test the waters. The response was so phenomenal that she was asked back every August for more than a dozen years, each stint eventually growing to a full two weeks in that intimate venue.
During the first summer of the COVID-19 pandemic, when basically all live performances in indoor venues were banned, an undaunted Maye and her cohorts performed at an outdoor, poolside venue in P-Town. Now, for the past three years, she has been raising the roof of the historic, acoustically excellent, 140-year-old Town Hall, which seats more than 700 people at full capacity. And it sure was full to bursting for her most recent triumph there.
To say that Maye was in phenomenal form for this show would be the understatement of the millennium. With the genius Tedd Firth as pianist-conductor arranger, and with bassist Marshall Wood and drummer Mark McLean along for the ride, the generous 90-minute program opened with a medley of songs featuring lyrics by Johnny Mercer: “The Song is You,” “Day In, Day Out,” “Too Marvelous for Words,” “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby,” “Jeepers Creepers” and “Come Rain or Come Shine.” As if that weren’t enough of a sampling of Mercer’s art, Maye and the musicians followed up with another gem of his: “Anyplace I Hang My Hat Is Home” from the 1946 musical, St. Louis Woman (music by Harold Arlen).
Next up, Maye favored us with the classic Kander and Ebb show tune “Cabaret,” including a reminder that she was the very first person to record the song way back in the mid-1960s—long before Liza got her hands on it, and even before Jill Haworth recorded it for the original Broadway cast album. This was followed by a quartet of standards: “I Love You” (Cole Porter), “My Romance” (Rodgers and Hart), “Why Did I Choose You?” (Leonard, Martin), and “That’s All” (Brandt, Haymes). Maye’s rendition of “No Bad News” from The Wiz (Larry Kerchner, attributed to Charlie Smalls) brought down the house as always, leading to a mini-medley of “Lazy Afternoon” from Broadway’s The Golden Apple (Moross, Latouche) and “Bye Bye Country Boy” (Blossom Dearie, Jack Segal) during which Maye exhibited far more sexual allure than any other near-centenarian could ever muster. (So, umm, effective in that respect was her rendition that, after it was over, some guy in the audience yelled “I’ll be your country boy!”—to which MM replied, without missing a beat, “I’ll meet you later.”)
A Duke Ellington-Billy Strayhorn section, including a definitive performance of “Lush Life,” led to the 
most magical moment of the evening, when Maye asked the audience, “What do you want to hear next?” Usually, this is answered by people shouting the titles of some of MM’s greatest hits, but on this occasion, a gent in the audience asked for “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?” Now, the lady has sung this gorgeous Michel Legrand, Marilyn and Alan Bergman song before, but not in quite some time, so she took a few seconds with Firth for him to find the right key and for her to decide if she should go for it. He did, and she did—and time stood still as we were treated to the most poignant, heartfelt rendition of the song that one could ever imagine. Oh, and despite the fact that the number is not part of her current repertoire, Maye was word perfect on the lyrics, thank you very much.
After that, there was nothing for Maye to do other than end with better-than-ever renditions of her most requested songs: “Guess Who I Saw Today” (Grand, Boyd), “Fifty Percent” (Billy Goldenberg, The Bergmans) from Ballroom, “Put on a Happy Face” (Strouse, Adams) from Bye, Bye Birdie, “Here’s to Life” (Butler, Molinary), and “It’s Today” (Jerry Herman) from Mame.
As the evening wound down, Maye mentioned that she’ll soon be receiving a lifetime achievement award from the LGBTQ+ elders advocacy nonprofit SAGE—“But I’m not through yet!” Indeed. If someone were to encounter Marilyn Maye offstage and ask, “What are you doing the rest of your life?”, the answer would no doubt be “Just what I’m doing now”—and better than anyone else on the planet.
Photos by Michael Portantiere
