“The Secret Of Life: Partners Volume 2” (Columbia Records)
By Eleni P. Austin
Although I went on to embrace Singer-Songwriters, Boy Bands (hello, the Jackson 5, The Osmonds), Jazz, Punk-most especially Punk- Power Pop and a plethora of other musical genres, my earliest influences were The Beatles, Greek music and Barbra Streisand. That’s right kids, I’ve loved Babs through good times and bad.
Growing up, my mother took me to nearly every movie musical that came to the theaters in the ‘60s and early ‘70s (which means we even sat through crap like The Boyfriend and Song Of Norway), she would always buy me the movie program and the soundtrack for each film. Funny Girl came out when I was five, and we saw that one a few times in the theater. I loved it so completely, I knew all the songs by heart. More than once during parties at our house, Irene would ask me to bust out a rendition of “Don’t Rain On My Parade,” and I willingly complied.
So, even as my tastes and musical obsessions shifted, I still made time for Barbra. When she published her autobiography, My Name Is Barbra, I was on the wait-list to borrow it from the library. A really good friend of mine told me “You’re too big a Barbra fan to wait,” and she gifted me the book, which was amazing. Rich with detail, sanguine and self-deprecating, exactly what you would expect from a perfectionist.
Just in case you don’t know it, Barbra was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1942. She has managed to be a popular artist for nearly 65 years, in fact, she is one of the best-selling recording artists of all time. Billboard ranks her as the greatest solo artist to ever grace the Billboard Top 200. Not merely a singer, the actress and director, she is also an EGOT winner, having won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony award.
Her father, Emmanual was a teacher, who died not long after Barbra’s first birthday. Her mother, Diana, possessed an operatic voice and she considered a career in music, but never pursued it. Barbra was deeply affected by the death of a father she barely knew, and grew up feeling like an outcast. Although she displayed a talent for singing at an early age, she had loftier ambitions. She idolized Marlon Brando and her dream was to become a serious actress. Singing was just a means to an end.
By the early ‘60s, she began taking acting lessons, and sang for her supper at various Greenwich Village clubs. At the Bon Soir, she opened for comedienne Phyllis Diller. Even as her prodigious voice drew accolades, she was advised to alter her rather distinctive nose and change her name to something more white-bread like Joanie Sands. She ignored the first piece of advice and slightly modified her name by removing the second “a” in Barbara.
She began to make a name for herself, but on her terms, she acquired a manager, Marty Erlichman (who remains her manager to this day), appeared on Broadway in I Can Get It For You Wholesale and performed on TV series like The Tonight Show and Judy Garland’s short-lived Variety show. There, the pair famously dueted on “Happy Days Are Here Again/Get Happy,” literally one superstar passing the torch to a rising star. In 1962, Barbra signed with Columbia Records (where she remains to this day), and the following year, her eponymous debut arrived. A year later, she was starring on Broadway playing legendary vaudevillian Fanny Brice in the musical Funny Girl. From there, her career skyrocketed.
She went on to make her silver screen debut, reprising her role in the film adaptation of Funny Girl, and won an Academy Award for Best Actress (tying with none other than Katharine Hepburn). Subsequently, she continued to make records, star in films and TV specials. She married Elliott Gould in 1966, and the couple welcomed their son Jason, but divorced in 1971. Meanwhile, she partnered with A-list actors: Steve McQueen, Dustin Hoffman, Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier, to form the First Artists production company. She also found the time to be politically active in the Democratic party.
In the ensuing years, Barbra has acted in classic films like What’s Up, Doc? and The Way We Were, as well as abysmal efforts like Up The Sandbox, The Owl & The Pussycat and For Pete’s Sake. By the mid ‘70s, her box office success allowed her more creative control on her film sets. She envisioned a Rock & Roll remake of A Star Is Born. She wound up co-producing the movie, as well as co-starring alongside charismatic singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson (R.I.P.) But when she clashed with the director, the press began to portray her as “difficult.” She drily noted at the time that a man would have been labelled a perfectionist. Despite mixed reviews, the 1976 film was a smash hit.
One of the few women to break Hollywood’s glass ceiling, she made her directorial debut starring in Yentl. A passion project she had been shepherding since the late ‘60s, finally came to fruition in 1983. The premise, seemed impossible, especially when she added a musical component to Isaac Bashevis Singer’s story about a young woman posing as a male Yeshiva student. But Babs pulled it off, it was another box office triumph. Eight years later, she repeated the feat with The Prince Of Tides. A critical and commercial success, it garnered seven Academy Award nominations including one for Best Picture. Predictably, she was snubbed in the Best Director category. In 1996, she directed and starred in The Mirror Has Two Faces, which performed respectably.
Musically, Barbra has occasionally challenged herself, taking a break from exploring the vast American Songbook of standards, in the ‘70s she covered songs by contemporary artists like David Bowie, Carole King, John Lennon, Joni Mitchell Paul Simon, Bill Withers and most winningly. Laura Nyro. She also learned to play guitar and began composing her own songs. She co-wrote “Evergreen,” for A Star Is Born, which won the Academy Award for Best Song.
Sometimes, her attempts to remain au courant, haven’t always landed. “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” was an ill-advised duet with Disco diva Donna Summer that sounded like the musical equivalent of two cats making an um, coital connection. Rote collaborations with Don Johnson, Celine Dion and Michael Bolton simply fell flat. But Barbra persevered.
By the close of the 20th century, she had found love with actor James Brolin, and the pair married in 1998. She has continued to tour and record at a leisurely clip, occasionally acting in successful movies like Meet The Fockers and Guilt Trip. In 2009 she changed it up again, by recruiting Jazz chanteuse Diana Krall to produce Love Is The Answer, an intimate collection of Jazz favorites. Critical acclaim was unanimous. Not surprisingly, it shot to #1 on the Billboard Top 200 chart.
After that, it was business as usual, an album devoted to her favorite songwriting team, Alan and Marilyn Bergman, as well as a couple of duets collaborations: Partners and Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway. But by 2018, horrified by T.A.C.O. Don’s first term in the White House, she recorded the album Walls. This time out she wasn’t just inspired, she was galvanized into action. Dismayed by the divisive political climate, the demonization, prejudice and casual cruelty on display. It was, in effect, her first protest record. An elegant effort that spoke truth to power.
Now, Barbra has returned with her 37th studio album, The Secret Of Life: Partners 2, a sequel of sorts to both 2014’s Partners, and 2016’s Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway. The record opens tentatively with a faithful take of the Roberta Flack classic, “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face.” Sharing the mic with Irish Folk-Rocker Hozier, the pair are swathed in strings. It begins with intro that’s loosely inspired by Mahler’s “Symphony No. 5 In C-Sharp Minor: IV Adagietto.” Trading verses, they completely commit to the lyrics, and it’s a beautiful rendition, but it doesn’t exude Soulful power that Roberta (R.I.P.), embodied so effortlessly.
For a few songs, Barbra stays in her lane, and the results are what you would expect. “One Heart, One Voice” is the album’s Diva-centric summit, as she collaborates with Ariana Grande and Mariah Carey. Another orchestral number, the instrumentation nearly devours the vocals, making it difficult to distinguish Ariana from Mariah. Cliched lyrics like “A light that shines, an answer to a prayer, through every trial, it helps to keep us strong, so strong, with love that guards the way, a hundred thousand heartbeats a day, a reason to rejoice, together with one heart, one voice,” feel trite.
“To Lose You Again,” with Sam Smith is slightly more interesting. Co-written by the British genderqueer musician, it’s powered by churchy piano, sanctified Hammond B3, thrumming bass, evanescent guitars and of course, a majestic orchestral arrangement. Conversational lyrics navigate the rocky shoals of a failed romance, offering a bit of a they-said, she-said “If you ever need a friend you can call me anytime, I’ll be civil, I’ll be kind, although love left us behind, I know you hope I still have feelings for you, I wish that I could say it was true.” The pair sync up on the chorus: “But I’m done singin’ the Blues, it’s not fair what you put me through, just face it, this is the end, I’m not gonna love you to lose you again,” which shares some musical DNA with Elton John’s “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues.”
Meanwhile, “Where Do I Go From You” would have been more potent had Babs gone it alone. At first, it’s, you know, just a girl and her orchestra. Awash in swelling strings, she mourns the loss of a tempestuous relationship: “Where do I go from you, now that I’ve lost everything I wanted most, what do I do when ever sin I’ve ever hungered for I tasted, and every miracle I ever prayed for came true?” When Josh’s commanding baritone (baritenor?) leaps in, the effect is disconcerting. It’s as though he’s interrupting a private reverie, and it seems wildly intrusive.
There are a couple of unexpected pairings here, “Letter To My 13 Year Old Self” with Icelandic Jazz-Pop singer-songwriter Laufey and “I Love Us” with Country superstar Tim McGraw. The former, written by Laufey, seems to channel Janis Ian’s epochal 1975 hit, “At Seventeen.” Although it opens with gauzy strings, the arrangement pares back to tender acoustic guitar, barely-there bass and a brushed beat. Barbra and Laufey alternate verses, as lyrics limn the discomfiture that accompanies adolescence: “I’m so sorry that they pick you last, try to say your foreign name and laugh, I know you feel loud, so different from the crowd of big blue eyes and long blonde hair, and boys that stare, but Baby, know that/You’ll grow up and grow so tough and charm them, write your story, fall in love a little too, the things you thought you’d never do, I wish I could go back and give her a squeeze, myself at 13, and just let her know, know that she’s beautiful.”
The latter adds a bit of down-home grit to her sonic palette. Although she’s conquered plenty of musical genres and even sung in other languages, she has only recorded with Country artists a handful of times. It feels like a missed opportunity, but she partially makes up for it with this song. Thankfully, the orchestration is mostly muted, giving way to feathery guitars, plaintive piano and keening pedal steel. The lyrics are a bit on the corny side, but as usual, Barbra invests her whole self, salting the lyrics with nuance and emotion. It’s nicely juxtaposed by Tim’s rough-hewn pragmatism.
The best tracks here pair Barbra with two slightly younger icons and a couple of legendary contemporaries. She teams up with Sting on his Samba-flavored song “Fragile.” The track opens with haunting duduk notes that fold into sinuous guitars, flinty bass and a propulsive beat. Thankfully, the orchestra remains in the background, giving the arrangement some technicolor heft. Even though this song is almost 40 years old, timeless lyrics like “If blood will flow when flesh and steel are one, drying in the color of the evening sun, tomorrow’s rain will wash the stains away, but something in our minds will always stay,” speak to the current climate of barbarism and vulnerability that grip this country. Splitting up the verses, their voices dovetail on the chorus.
The title track was a deep cut on James Taylor’s 1977 JT record. Sun-dappled acoustic guitar is matched by sylvan strings, loose-limbed bass and a tick-tock beat. James’ honey and woodsmoke tenor blends perfectly with Barbra’s seemingly ageless mezzo-soprano. Lyrics offer a pocket philosophy: “The secret of love is in opening up your heart, it’s okay to feel afraid, but don’t let it stand in your way no longer, cause anyone knows that love is the only road, and since we’re here for a while, might as well show some style,” The message is straightforward, but it feels like the perfect panacea for these complicated times.
On “My Valentine,” my pre-K worlds collide when Barbra collaborates with an actual Beatle. But it feels wholly apropos. Even as Paul McCartney and the rest of the Fab Four were tearing it up with original songs and scorching Little Richard covers, their early repertoire also included glossy hits like “A Taste Of Honey” and “Till There Was You” from The Music Man. “My Valentine” is a McCartney original that appeared on his 2011 album devoted to the American Songbook. He acquits himself beautifully, and song feels like a long-lost classic. It unspools with the intimacy of a torch song, as liquid arpeggios wash over whispery bass, stately keys, a burnished beat, and, inevitably, subdued orchestration. Individually and in tandem their vocal chemistry is palpable as lyrics offer an encomium to late life romance: “As the days and nights would pass me by, I’d tell myself I was waiting for a sign, then she appeared, a love so fine, my Valentine/And I will love him for life, and I will never let a day go by without remembering the reason why, he makes me certain that I can fly.” The album’s finest moment is also its most unexpected. Barbra and Bob Dylan have traveled parallel career paths since both of their careers began. He signed with Columbia Records in 1961, she followed in 1962. He revealed in a 1971 interview that he’d written “Lay Lady Lay,” with Barbra in mind. But this is their first collaboration. Rather than choose one of his own songs, he suggested the standard, “The Very Thought Of You,” made famous by Nat King Cole. It opens with a smoky harmonica intro that is bookended by swirly orchestration, sultry Hammond B3, wistful piano, bewitching guitars, besotted bass lines and a beguiling beat. Bob kicks it into gear with a surprisingly smooth croon, Barbra follows suit and their exquisite phrasing paints a portrait of a lovestruck couple who are simply head over heels: “The mere idea of you, the longing here for you, you’ll never know how slow the moments go, till I’m near to you/I see your face in every flower, I see your eyes in stars above, it’s just the thought of you, the very thought of you, my love.” It’s such a tender, unexpected and irresistible evocation of true love. The record ends on a somber note with “Love Will Survive,” which Barbra originally performed in conjunction with the harrowing historical mini-series, The Tattooist Of Auschwitz. Here, she teams with Seal, his scratchy rasp quietly elevates yearning lyrics that take on a new meaning within the context of the series. Along with her usual production team, this album features some superstar assists from legendary session men like Dean Parks, Waddy Wachtel, Leland Sklar, Greg Leisz, Lenny Castro Gregoire Maret and Russ Kunkel. The Secret Of Life mostly gets it right, it’s sure to please old fans and possibly win some new ones. It debuted on the Billboard chart at # 31, and #4 on the Top Albums Sales chart. It officially extends Barbra’s record for having a Top 40 album in every decade since the ‘60s. Still, I wish she would take bigger risks. It would certainly be intriguing to hear an album devoted to Country classics like “Sweet Dreams,” “I Can’t Stop Loving You,” “Your Cheatin’ Heart” and “Help Me Make It Through The Night.” Or, how about an album that tackled the three B’s: Burt Bacharach, The Beatles and Bob Dylan? Wouldn’t you love to get her spin on “Walk On By” or “I Say A Little Prayer?” “In My Life” and “Eleanor Rigby?” “I Threw It All Away,” “You’re Going To Make Me Lonesome When You Go,” or “Most Of The Time?” Imagine the possibilities! Ultimately, Barbra’s going to Barbra, and I’ll happily to settle for that.
