Lies of Handsome Men by Beth Lane

the songs range between the haunting melody of ann hampton callaway's never-before-recorded, "do you know how beautiful you are?" to the wacky "you've got to be loved to be healthy & i'm the healthiest gal in town" by jack yellen. beth is wise beyond her years, always vulnerable and constantly revealing. bridging the gap between broadway, jazz, pop and folk, it is impossible to profile beth into only one category. beth is not a jazz singer, or a pop singer, etc. and so forth, beth lane is a rising star.

lies of handsome men, was recorded at ppi recording in manhattan, and was engineered, mixed and mastered by ppi's owner, chip fabrizi. "i had never produced an album before" says beth, "but i'm smart and i knew i had to get the best people around me to create not just a marketable product, but, a disc that people would continue to listen to over and over again. although chip takes an assistant producer credit on the cd, beth insists that aside from selecting the material which she did with musical director-pianist, carl danielsen, chip did everything else and is entirely responsible for the quality and edge that everyone seems to be diggin.'

george small, a veteran studio pianist, and currently the composer for many of the lifetime biographies on cable, filled in on the ivories when carl couldn't be there. george also created all of the sounds on the synth that make this album sound like there is a 13 piece band. fiercely modest, george never talks about working with john lennon and yoko ono on double fantasy, but chip let the cat out of the bag. "george can execute anything through his fingers. he's highly creative and never upstages the lyric." that's really evident in the horn section george creates in cy coleman and carolyn leigh's, "when in rome."

as for guitarist marc daine, his acoustic, electric and mandolin create the phenomenal groove in jason robert brown's "stars and the moon", placing it firmly in the land of pop/rock. "marc just kept bringing more instruments in, so literally, everything he plays, we used." his banjo is awesome in stephen sondheim's, "more." months later i found out he plays the sax, too. "if only i had known!"

saying that chip is the chief cook and bottle washer of his own establishment is an understatement. he played drums throughout the entire cd. and his conga and bongo deliciously heat up meredith willson's "til there was you" and jule styne, betty comden & adolf green's, "long before i knew you."

lies of handsome men opens with a three-quarter waltz arrangement of marc blitstein's art song, "i wish it so." "although i learned the song in the traditional manner, one day i walked into carl danielsen's studio singing it as a three-quarter. he said it was sacreligious. then i had no other choice but to prove that it not only could be done that way, but also to see if i could get those who know the song well, to believe that it must be sung that way."

beth's hushed ballads, "too late now," "dance," and "how can i forget?" are brilliantly simple. no adornment, just the lyrics, lane is a singer who can traverse the musical map with ease. she's an artist who takes risks, but more importantly, she is an artist who is revealing. and, that's profoundly evident in the title track of lies of handsome men.

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