Kenny Werner & Roseanna Vitro - Delirium Blues Project: Serve Or Suffer (2008)

The original idea behind the Delirium Blues Project was to revamp - 'cover' is out of place in this regard - of songs from a wide variety of musical styles and place them in a bluesy setting. The initiators of this project were keyboardist Kenny Werner and singer Roseanne Vitro. With a five-piece horn section including trumpet player Randy Brecker, saxophonist James Carter and trombonist Ray Anderson, and bassist John Patitucci, success seems guaranteed. Still, the shelf for the opening track What Is Hip? from Tower Of Power went badly wrong. The blues is nowhere present and due to Vitrio's stale rendition, the piece sounds anything but hip. The blues only really starts with Blue, which gained fame through the interpretation of Lambert, Hendricks & Ross. The band shows itself on all songs as a well-played blues band and especially the wind instruments steal the show. The big flaw of Serve Or Suffer remains Vitro, who comes across as too neat and controlled to be able to speak of full blues vocals.