Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The unstaged sleeve photo – more holiday snap than posed cover shot – illustrates one of the problems of posthumous success: it's too late to effect any kind of stylish makeover, and one has to draw instead upon a hoard of personal photos probably not intended for publication. That it seems to fit Eva Cassidy speaks volumes for the honest, unalloyed nature of her performances here, which, like the earlier collections Time After Time and her 1998 breakthrough Songbird, are drawn from disparate sources reflecting her abilities in folk, blues and jazz – a diversity that stopped her securing a major-label contract in her lifetime, but has clearly proven acceptable to a public unconcerned with industry niches. Cushioned in small-combo arrangements, the jazzier material, such as "Fever" and "You've Changed", is tackled with an easy, expressive facility that directs the former, for instance, closer to Little Willie John's original than Peggy Lee. But it's the folksier performances, such as Sandy Denny's "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?", and her soulful solo treatment of standards such as "Imagine" and "It Doesn't Matter Any More" that reveal Cassidy's natural warmth: her gentle blues inflections on the latter bestow a pained resignation, while her impassioned simplicity even de-saccharinises "Tennessee Waltz". The only wrong note is Stevie Wonder's "It Can Only Be Me", whose soul-diva stylings are like Kryptonite to Cassidy's essential sincerity.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments