Karen Souza is around for a while, under various pseudonyms she provide vocals to some electronic music products, mostly in house gender. She had a nice, smooth voice, some may say quit sensual, but I guess if any man will take a look at her pictures, most of us will thinking about other qualities she may had then about singing, but hey! what the hack, that’s why they call us “pigs” after all, isn’t it? 😀
Karen Souza begun flirting – what else she could possibly do? 😀 – with the idea of singing jazz and this was the starting point of her Cooltrane Quartet and they take a ride on the path of pop and rock classics set to jazz beats and arrangements. It’s hard to fail with a set list made of all time greatest hits as “Strawberry Fields Forever”, “Creep”, “Tainted Love”, “Personal Jesus”, “Billie Jean”, “Bette Davis Eyes” or “Every Breath You Take”.
“She and her bandmembers breathe life into mythical hits that take on new meaning when accompanied by live jazz musicians. They also present new material developed by Karen and throw in the occasional jazz standard to keep the crowd guessing.
The Cooltrane Quartet is made up of three musicians whose instrumental accompaniment provide the perfect background to Karen´s luscious singing. Together the quartet provides subtle and fresh interpretations of these much loved tracks. They are also prone to the occasional improvisation, as is so often the case with jazz artists, which lends a unique touch to each of their performances.” (taken from her official site)
And yes, this is a nice record, a smooth collection of 12 hits re-arranged with taste and relocated in the smooth jazz area, and yes, Karen Souza have a nice voice, she gave a touch of sensuality to this classics. It’s relaxing to listen this songs and probably it’s a pleasure to see Karen and her band mates live.
