Vocalist Rupsha Sen picks her six favourite jazz standards

When Sunny Gets Blue

The version that speaks to me is Sean Levitts’s version from his album From Paris with Love (vol. 2), 2003. The song takes on a slow, steady pace with Sean Levitt weaving his unique guitar lines around the haunting vocals of Stella A. Levitt.

The song instills in me a sense of beautiful melancholia, the lyrics speaking of great loves lost and the search for “new love” to “kiss away” the “lonely tears”.

This is definitely one of the songs that is on my “rainy-day” playlist, as it compares the complexities of love to the forever changing skies.

These Foolish Things

If lyrics could make you fall in love with a song, then this is the one you can’t help falling in loving with. The lyrics are written by Eric Maschwitz and music is by Jack Strachey.

The first time I heard this song was when I was quite young while watching Humphrey Bogart’s Tokyo Joe (1949) as Florence Marly sang it. Eventually I listened to Ella Fitzgerald’s version of the song and fell hopelessly in love with it.

The lyrics are just magical stating so many various little things that remind us of our love such as a “cigarette that bears a lipstick’s traces”, or “gardenia perfume lingering on a pillow” or “a song that Crosby sings”.

Ella’s voice is hauntingly beautiful, painting a portrait with her voice as she sings the beautiful melody. It’s a simple song, but I guess this song proves that beauty lies in simplicity.

In a Sentimental Mood

Composed by Duke Ellington, the version by Duke Ellington and John Coltrane is my favourite. The combination of these two musicians creates a magical, harmonious piece of music that is impossible to not fall in love with.

I remember reading a funny story about the inception of this song and how it was written by Ellington to pacify two women who were having a row with one another over a man. Another version of this song that I love is by Bill Evans from his album California Here I Come.

The lyrical version of the song, particularly the one sung by Ella Ftizgerald, is also a gorgeous rendition as she sings, “In a sentimental mood, I’m in a world so heavenly, for I never dreamt that you’d be loving sentimental me.” Such a simple yet honest way to express that basic yearning for love that is present in each one of us.

All Blues

Composed by Miles Davis for his influential 1959 album Kind of Blue, I remember hearing this song for the first time back 2014.

The song is a “twelve-bar blues” in 6/4, but the chord sequence is such that it is formed entirely of seventh chords and instead of the usual V chord in the turnaround there’s a b VI chord. This is what sets the song apart for me.

Another distinctive feature of this song is the bass line that repeats itself through almost the entire song.

This song was originally an instrumental piece but Oscar Brown Jr. added lyrics to it later.

The version of the song with lyrics that speaks to me the most is the one by Ernestine Anderson. I have fond memories of performing this particular version of the song with the band, Big Family.

The honeyed sound of Ernestine Anderson’s voice along with her churchy overtones sing about the how everything in life is blue, the different shades, layers, interpretations of blue and how in the end “we’re all blues” and I find myself believing her every time, powerless under the spell of her magic.

On Green Dolphin Street

Originally composed for a film in 1947 by Bronislaw Kaper with lyrics by Ned Washington , this song became a jazz standard after it was recorded by Miles Davis in 1958.

The version of this song that I heard recently that has quickly made its way to one my favourites is the one by George Benson.

It’s hard to explain why this song resonates with me, but, musically, its probably the effect of the switch from major to minor and the way it descends chromatically to the relative minor makes the song so harmonically rich that its almost always entirely captivating. Apart from this, the melody of the song sung by Benson is beautiful and the song itself is very groovy making it definitely one of my favourites.

Stormy Weather

This song is what you would call a torch song, that is one that laments over lost or unrequited love. It was written in 1933 by Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler and was first sung by Ethel Waters at The Cotton Club nightclub in Harlem. So, it was born right out of the era of supremely talented Black musicians who would perform for White audiences during the time of the Harlem Renaissance movement.

The first version of the song that I ever heard was by Lena Horne (1943), and soon after that I heard the version by Etta James (1960) and fell in love with the song and it has remained as not just one of my favourite jazz standards but also as one of my favourite songs since. Another version of the song I adore is the one by Kay Starr, that is the one I’ve been listening to a lot lately. I definitely have a wish to do a beautiful collaboration on this song with fellow musicians sometime soon.