Nellie McKay: Normal As Blueberry Pie (A Tribute To Doris Day)

Nellie McKay gives Doris her due with Normal As Blueberry Pie - A Tribute To Doris Day (October 13th / Verve)

For Nellie, producing, arranging, and performing Normal As Blueberry Pie was the natural outcome of all the years she has spent listening enraptured to Ms. Day’s music. “She was - and still is - ahead of her time,” says Nellie, who received the Doris Day Music Award in 2005 for “The Dog Song” in recognition of her dedication to animal rights.

Nellie reviewed a recent biography of Day for The New York Times, and is one of the few people in 30 years to be granted an interview with Ms. Day (The Bark magazine, 2007). “What she possessed - beyond her beauty, physical grace, and natural acting ability - was a resplendent voice that conveyed enormous warmth and feeling,” writes Nellie (The New York Times, 2007).

Normal As Blueberry Pie features 12 songs handpicked from over 600 recordings by Ms. Day, with an original by McKay. Hailed as an “old pop soul in her ability to draw so effortlessly on a remarkable range of styles” (LA Times) who is “supremely gifted, charming and darkly funny” (Washington Post), McKay bridges the big band era of the ‘40s into Day’s later film career.

“From time capsule to timeless, her humanity always shines through. Her canon combines modern freshness with reassurance,” adds Nellie, who plays several instruments on the album, and uses four different old-time mics to evoke various moods (all lovingly engineered and mixed by recording maestro James Farber).

Exasperating, exhilarating, and altogether uncategorizable, this fourth album again showcases Nellie’s fresh take on music and life with a curtsy to Doris, a nod to convention, and a unique twist all her own.

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Doris Day is the # 1 female box-office star of all time, and one of the most prolific recording artists in history. In 1977, she became a leader in the animal welfare movement, an important cause for McKay. “She’s pursuing a change in the mind-set that allows human beings to treat other species as objects,” says Nellie. The Doris Day Animal League has more than 180,000 members and focuses on lobbying Washington for pro-animal legislation.

Nellie McKay has released three critically acclaimed albums: Get Away From Me, Pretty Little Head and Obligatory Villagers, and won a Theater World Award for her portrayal of Polly Peachum in the Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, as well as contributing to The Onion, Interview Magazine, and The New York Times Book Review. Her music has been heard on Weeds, Grey’s Anatomy, NCIS and Privileged, and she has dueted with Eartha Kitt, Trey Anastasio, Taj Mahal, and shared the stage with Odetta, Lou Reed, Elvis Costello and other notables in aid of various progressive pursuits.

Normal As Blueberry Pie - A Tribute To Doris Day Tracklist

“The Very Thought of You” (Ray Noble)
“Do Do Do” (George & Ira Gershwin)
“Wonderful Guy” (Richard Rodgers / Oscar Hammerstein II)
“Meditation” (Antonio Carlos Jobim / Norman Gimbel)
“Mean to Me” (Fred E. Ahlert / Roy Turk)
“Crazy Rhythm” (Joseph Meyer & Roger Wolfe Kahn / Irving Cesear)
“Sentimental Journey” (Les Brown & Ben Homer / Bud Green)
“If I Ever Had a Dream” (Nellie McKay)
“Black Hills of Dakota” (Sammy Fain / Paul Francis Webster)
“Dig It” (Hal Bourne, Johnny Mercer)
“Send Me No Flowers” (Burt Bacharach / Hal David)
“Close Your Eyes” (Bernice Petkere)
“I Remember You” (Victor Schertzinger / Johnny Mercer)

www.nelliemckay.com

Watch the video-
In the studio with Nellie McKay

Critical praise

“Doris Day is an emblem of sunshine, communion with nature and animals, and common civility… In a time when cynicism rules, her eager humanity is ever more precious…”
- Nellie McKay, The New York Times Book Review

“Ms. McKay has picked up not just antique musical styles, but also a tone that’s even more elusive: arch but amiable, with teeth behind the giggles.”
- Jon Pareles, The New York Times

“ Thanks to (McKay), the Great American Songbook has a living, breathing present as well as a glorious past.”
- Joan Anderman, The Boston Globe