This Bitter Earth Veronica Swift

• 1 This Bitter Earth 04:27
• 2 How Lovely to Be a Woman 04:10
• 3 You've Got to Be Carefully Taught 05:16
• 4 Getting to Know You 06:19
• 5 The Man I Love 04:50
• 6 You're the Dangerous Type 04:25
• 7 Trust in Me 05:19
• 8 He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss) 02:11
• 9 As Long as He Needs Me 04:55
• 10 Everybody Has the Right to Be Wrong 02:53
• 11 Prisoner of Love 04:16
• 12 The Sports Page 06:21
• 13 Sing 05:44
• Total Runtime 01:01:06

Info for This Bitter Earth

Veronica Swift flips the script on This Bitter Earth, the captivating follow-up to her 2019 Mack Avenue Records debut, Confessions. Whereas Confessions played out like pages from her personal diary, on the new album, the 27-year-old singer and master song interpreter looks outward while addressing social ills that plague the world today.

This Bitter Earth takes on the song-cycle characteristics of such classic LPs as Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love, and Mary J. Blige’s My Life. For her album, Swift tackles sexism [“How Lovely to Be a Woman”], domestic abuse [“He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)”], racism/ xenophobia [“You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught”] and the dangers of fake news [“The Sports Page”].

Accompanied by a team of kindred spirts that includes pianist Emmet Cohen, guitarist Armand Hirsch and flutist Aaron Johnson, bassist Yasushi Nakamura, and drummer Bryan Carter, Swift curates material that covers multiple genres, including jazz, American musicals, vintage R&B and contemporary rock.

“I’ve been waiting to do this album for years,” Swift says before explaining that she usually conceives her albums far in advance. She recorded much of the material in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic forced the world into a near total standstill. But the time allowed her to live with songs at different parts of her life. Eventually, she recognized the connective tissue between them. The big challenge, however, was crafting a cohesive narrative.

Swift delves into a dramatic yet sardonic makeover of “How Lovely to Be a Woman,” a Charles Strouse and Lee Adams tune from the 1960 musical, Bye Bye Birdie. “As I’m coming into the world, having more of a feeling of who I am and being more confident in that, I realize now how this song had a lot more ambiguity and cynicism involved,” Swift says. “I tried to make an arrangement that maintained the childlike feel I had while listening to it but still insert some of that sarcasm in it. The song also allows me to present more of my humorous side.”

Themes of abuse appears with Swift’s cover of the Crystals’ 1962 provocative R&B tune “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss).” “This song just makes your stomach curdle,” Swift says. “It’s uncomfortable to sing; it’s uncomfortable to listen. But the original version by the Crystals is so the opposite; it’s so indicative of the 1960s victim woman who stays with the man who physically assaults her. I’ve never heard a version of this song that had gone the other way in terms of making it a somber piece. I wanted to give listeners another option in listening to this song. So, I stripped away all the other instruments and chord progressions and just made it me and guitar. I arranged it to sound almost singer-songwriterly.”

“You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught” comes from a musical – 1949’s South Pacific. The envelope-pushing, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II-penned song illustrates how racism and xenophobia are learned behaviors, often projected onto children during their early development. “I was always perplexed at how such a deep and dark subject matter in South Pacific was sung so upbeat,” Swift recalls. “I think it was written intentionally to not sit well with the audience. I wanted to come up with an arrangement that’s very antsy and mad. So, I put a little bit of that rock beat on the chorus and sing angrily. To me, it sounds like what the song was meant to be.”

The album switches gears with Swift’s cunning version of Dave Frishberg’s socially conscious song “The Sports Page.” She uses the song’s topical lyrics to invoke the prevalence of fake news during President Trump’s administration. “It is amazing how a song written in the late 1960s is still relevant, and its brilliance is that it doesn’t target a specific demographic,” Swift says.

“I want this album to have two separate approaches,” she explains. “I wanted to start with women’s place in society now and how it’s changing. During the second half, I wanted to address other ailments in the world, whether it’s racism or fake news. But I don’t take any political stances. I’m very clear with my audience that as an artist I address certain issues as an outsider looking in.”

Now with This Bitter Earth, her second Mack Avenue Records album, Swift’s ascendance as a 21st century jazz torchbearer continues.

Veronica Swift, vocals
Emmet Cohen, piano
Yashushi Nakamura, bass
Bryan Carter, drums
Aaron J Johnson, flute
Armand Hirsch, guitar

Veronica Swift
At just 25 years old, Veronica Swift has built a résumé that even many late-career jazz singers would envy: tours as a featured vocalist with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and Chris Botti; a guest collaboration with Michael Feinstein; engagements at A-list clubs like Birdland, Jazz Standard, Dizzy’s Club and Jazz Showcase; gigs at top festivals including Monterey, Montreal and Telluride, where she’s headlined. She began performing with her musician parents, the late pianist Hod O’Brien and the singer/educator/author Stephanie Nakasian, as a child, and in 2015 she earned second place in the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Vocals Competition, the most prestigious contest in the art form. In other words, her command of the vocal-jazz tradition is astounding.

Now comes Confessions, Swift’s first effort for Mack Avenue Records and her proper breakout debut. On the album, alternately accompanied by Benny Green and Emmet Cohen, two of the finest jazz pianists of their respective generations, Swift showcases the powerfully expressive, deliciously evocative voice that’s garnered her so many distinguished opportunities. But there’s more – some X-factors that, in their stealthy way, make Confessions smarter, riskier and altogether deeper than even the most stellar Songbook record.

For Swift, it starts with the tunes. What she’s looking for is an inspired narrative – the kind of story-songs she can use to mend her own wounds, to connect with the shared humanity in her audience and to remind listeners that perseverance leads to healing. “You’re carrying this heavy burden of something you’ve experienced,” she begins, “and how are you going to unload it? With music.” The trick, Swift explains, is to “share your story without getting too personal about it.”

The result of Swift’s concept is a 12-track program filled with oft-overlooked gems that hold a special yet adaptable meaning in the young singer’s life. On André and Dory Previn’s “You’re Gonna Hear From Me,” she offers a swinging, self-empowered declaration, tapping into her own early experiences in New York and on the road. Clay Boland and Moe Jaffe’s “Gypsy in My Soul” pays homage to Swift’s Hungarian Gypsy roots.

The always hilarious “I’m Hip,” written by Dave Frishberg and Bob Dorough – whom Swift says was like an uncle growing up – takes Swift back to her early days on the New York City scene, when she was meeting all the heavy cats and doing her best just to hang on and find her wavelength. Elsewhere, on cuts like the Previns’ “Forget About the Boy,” the Harry Tobias/Roy Ingraham number “No Regrets,” Swift’s own “I Hope She Makes You Happy” and an ingenious melding of Mel Tormé’s “A Stranger in Town” and Victor Schertzinger’s “I Don’t Wanna Cry Anymore,” Swift stares down heartbreak.

But perhaps the most stunning, heartrending piece here is Swift’s medley of sorts combining the Arthur Schwartz/Howard Dietz song “Confession” with Jessie Mae Robinson and Nina Simone’s “The Other Woman.” “When I look at songs,” Swift explains, “I think, ‘What’s act one and what’s act two?’” She saw these two numbers as explorations of the same character, crafted using similar strategies; the lyricists reveal their characters’ truths via sly, graceful twists in the story. Still, the perspectives crisscross in unresolved ways that allow for plenty of interpretation and self-reflection. Just as Swift is able to use her research and taste to shine a light on undervalued songsmiths, her voice evokes singers beyond the usual triptych of Ella, Sarah and Billie (though she conjures them up plenty, too). Instead, her touchstones stretch further back and look between the cracks to include stylists like Peggy Lee, Dinah Washington, June Christy, Connee Boswell, Ethel Waters, Mildred Bailey and, especially, Anita O’Day, whose elegant moxie permeates Confessions. Like O’Day, Swift is also a musician-first kind of leader and arranger, who immerses herself into her accompaniment and lets her players stretch out. With personnel like this, we should feel thankful she does. Green’s band includes bassist David Wong and drummer Carl Allen, and Cohen’s trio features bassist Russell Hall and drummer Kyle Poole.

Of course, Swift’s most profound influence has been her brilliant parents. Her father’s credits include Chet Baker, Art Farmer and Donald Byrd, and her mother has released 10 albums as a leader in addition to her longstanding work in education. Surprisingly, Swift’s upbringing was business as usual. She was raised on a cow farm in Charlottesville, Virginia, attending public school, becoming interested in classical music and, later, jazz and rock, and having a healthy, well-rounded childhood she continues to cherish today.

“I just had this extra thing that the other kids didn’t have,” she says, “which was, on the weekends, ‘I’m going on a trip with mom and dad and they’re gonna play a show.’” She was the little kid backstage with the coloring book, she remembers, “listening but not listening. But all the information is going in there.” When she’d get tired at a venue where there was no proper backstage area, she’d sometimes climb into an upright bass case and take a nap. Throughout it all, her parents were influences of humility and quiet strength. “They’re two of the most selfless musicians,” Swift says. “Watching my mom perform, she’s always been this nurturing energy. I look at myself when I’m singing and say, ‘Am I maintaining that?’”

Before the Monk Competition took place in Los Angeles in 2015, Swift had been traversing a very trying time, personally. She’d been notified about her father’s cancer diagnosis and was experiencing frustrations with music school (that had inspired her, in part, to write an ambitious metal-tinged rock opera), so she went into the competition with greater concerns and consequently put less pressure on herself. “Which, I think, is why I did so well, because I approached it from a natural, grounded place,” she says. “I was like, ‘I’m just gonna go sing and make good music and meet good people.’ There was no stigma about competition.”

In the end it was the competition, which boasts a high media profile and benchmark for success, that spurred Swift on toward the career she enjoys today. “After that, I said, ‘Maybe I really should do this,’” she recalls.

She continues to forge ahead in her creative pursuits, writing new music and architecting new ways to match her incredible technique, from ballad-singing to scatting, with choice repertoire and expert band-leading. But Confessions is a masterful document of her current moment, a beautifully crafted business card for her far-reaching skillset.

“It presents a story of my history and why I play this music,” she says. “But what I really hope people get out of this record is that no matter what happens, just stay focused, stay on your course and everything will turn out OK. Because if there’s anything I’ve learned from playing music, it’s that.”

This album contains no booklet.