By Marilyn Lester***In what might be termed, Classroom Cabaret, vocalist Vanessa Racci—aka the Jazzy Italian—and pianist-singer Robert Lamont, delivered a music and illustrated, fact-based performance of the songs of Harry Warren From Tin Pan Alley to Hollywood at Birdland Theater. Amazingly, along with back stories and general information, the pair packed a little over 30 tunes into about 80 minutes of stage time.
Early on in the show, Lamont referred to “Harry Who Complex.” Why “Harry Who?” Warren (), born, Salvatore Antonio Guaragna in Brooklyn, and who had a spectacular musical career, was notoriously low key. There’s a story (true or not) that when he went to receive the first of his three Best Song Academy Awards that no one knew who he was. Those Best Songs, which the duo sang: ““Lullaby of Broadway,” (Al Dubin), “You’ll Never Know” (Mack Gordon) and “On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe” (Johnny Mercer). Warren ‘s catalog totals over 800 songs, up there with the likes of Harold Arlen, Irving Berlin and Duke Ellington. He wrote for about 56 feature films but his work has been heard in over 300 films. One of the highlights of From Tin Pan Alley to Hollywood was a peek into the many cartoons (i.e. Merry Melodies) containing Warren tunes.
But Warren began on Tin Pan Alley and that’s why this show was presented in partnership with the Tin Pan Alley American Popular Music Project, of which Lamont is a Board member and Education Committee head. Before moving along the Warren time-line from the beginning, the pair began with an upbeat, jazzy “Jeepers Creepers” (Johnny Mercer). Since a song is words and music, among Warren’s several collaborators, Al Dubin and Mack Gordon were the most prolific regulars. The opener revealed Lamont’s pop style of playing and Racci’s lovely soprano, with occasional forays into scat. With Lamont mostly in the lead, introducing the numbers and starting with the verse, the template was set; the execution of the songs thus included trade-offs and sometime duets.
Before Hollywood called and staked its claim on Warren, there was song-plugger Harry and then the Warren who began writing for Broadway. One of his first hits was 1925’s “I Love My Baby” (Bud Green), which Lamont embellished with some acting riffs. In “Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder” (Joe Young, Sam Lewis, 1929) the pair had fun with this tease song of irony. Also great fun was Warren’s Latin phase, spurred by President 
Franklin Roosevelt’s 1933 initiative, The Good Neighbor policy, aimed at strengthening relations with Central and South America. Written for Brazilian bombshell, Carmen Miranda, “You Discover You’re in New York,” a humorous novelty number, had a mambo-esque, joyous delivery by the two.
One of the smartly-conceived components of the program was in presenting lesser known Warren tunes. In a mega-medley, the big hits got an airing; among them were “You’ll Never Know” (Mack Gordon), “The More I See You” (Mack Gordon), “I Only Have Eyes for You” (Al Dubin), “There Will Never Be Another You” (Mack Gordon) and a big treat, with the verse that’s hardly ever done, “At Last” (Mack Gordon). And thanks to the long-running 1980s Broadway show, 42nd Street, Lamont and Racci gave us the rhythms and swinging melodies of “Forty Second Street” and “Lullaby of Broadway,” both with lyrics by Al Dubin.
With an abundance of collateral material: sheet music images, photos, film clips and interviews and audio of the great man himself, Lamont and Racci made a case for Warren-awareness; and the show, about this titan of the American Songbook, was as much a delight as it was educational. For an encore, and a Happy Holidays farewell, the duo offered an uptempo, cheery “It Happened in Sun Valley” (Mack Gordon).
