New CD! Jazz Police Pick of Favorite Recordings of 2007




Click here to listen to The Jazz Connection interview
on Minnesota Public Radio about the CD release

"Maud Hixson brings to these songs the casual sophistication they call for, so that they sound like what Ira Gershwin said a lyric should be — “everyday conversation that happens to rhyme.” She brings out of them the wit and ingenuity the lyricists and composer used in handling the Tin Pan Alley formulas. She sings these great songs as their songwriters wanted. The song becomes not an occasion to display her gorgeously sultry voice but to inhabit the song and become the character the lyric portrays. As songwriters say, “She reads the lyric.” Her performance (and that of Rick Carlson) — understated, sensuous, insouciant — shows why such songs are the closest thing America has to a vital classical repertory of song."
--Philip Furia, author of The Poets of Tin Pan Alley: A History of America's Great Lyricists and biographies of Irving Berlin, Ira Gershwin, and Johnny Mercer.

"Just before Christmas last year, the jazz Santa brought Twin Cities listeners the finest homegrown vocal CD of 2007 -- Maud Hixson and Rick Carlson's beautiful, understated, timeless duets collection, Love's Refrain. Piano + voice + Great American Songbook = romance, with a capital L."
--Tom Surowicz, Minneapolis StarTribune

"Love’s Refrain is a delectable new CD of intimate Great American Songbook duets by understated singer Maud Hixson and her chapeau-sporting hubby, the ever-eloquent Basie-loving pianist Rick Carlson. Hixson manages to be sultry yet never vampish. She grabs the listener early and often, but always in a conversational manner, always in the service of the lyric. If you’re looking for belting or scatting, go elsewhere. Carlson’s piano accompaniment is similarly devoid of flash - sensitive always, sublime often. Love’s Refrain is a timeless album..."
--Tom Surowicz, Minneapolis StarTribune

"There seems to be a disproportionate number of really good female vocalists in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. Well, that’s the way it looks from my vantage point, a few hundred miles away. And to my list, I’ll add Maud Hixson. Covering what we call the American Songbook is easy in one way. You know the material is good. But it was good for somebody else, too. And somebody after that, and somebody after that. Quick. Over the Rainbow. Judy Garland, right? Fly Me To The Moon. Frank. But if you choose the material carefully, your imprint can become the new one. Ms. Hixson, I think, has successfully nibbled around the edges in her choice of material. With only a piano (a lightly swinging Rick Carlson) for backup, Ms. Hixson’s voice is front and center. The choices are familiar, but not immediately so, and the mark she leaves is delicate, and crystalline, and pure. Mr. Carlson and Ms. Hixson create an intimacy, and through ten tracks, never break the spell. Cool, but never detached. Hard to get, maybe. Her voice draws you in, always closer. Closer. My favorites include Van Heusen’s Here’s That Rainy Day, along with Hoagy Carmichael’s Stardust, and a rarer Harold Arlen tune, Bad For Each Other. Judging from her website, Ms. Hixson stays busy performing around her native Twin Cities area. No wonder. Good stuff? Yes. And very highly recommended. Three and one-half stars out of four."
--Doug Boynton, GirlSingers.org

Lauded as a female Chet Baker because of her unadorned ‘cool’ approach to the standard song, Hixson brings a measure of hip sophistication to the jazz tradition. With golden-hued clarity, great diction and the fabulous accompaniment of pianist Rick Carlson, this pretty Minnesotan tackles familiar gems and rarely recorded pieces such as Billy Strayhorn’s Lotus Blossom and J. Russell Robinson’s Meet Me at No Special Place. One would hope that Love’s Refrain and her earlier release, Small Batch, will propel her out of the prairies into greater orbits or renown."
--John Stevenson, EJazzNews

"The folks in Minnesota also have a singer who will raise the eyebrows of admiration of anyone lucky enough to hear her. Maud Hixson had escaped my radar until Love’s Refrain arrived in the mail. Accompanied by the piano of Rick Carlson, Hixson performs a program of ten wonderful songs. She mixes standards such as With a Song in My Heart, A Ghost of a Chance, Here’s That Rainy Day, Remind Me, Stardust and Lucky to Be Me with some tunes that do not turn up on many collections like Bob Dorough’s There’s Never Been a Day, the hip Meet Me at No Special Place, popularized by Nat Cole, a rarity from Harold Arlen and Carolyn Leigh, Bad for Each Other, and Billy Strayhorn’s Lotus Blossom, with a lovely lyric by Roger Schore and Carol Sloane. Hixson has a crystal clear instrument that caresses each lyric with sensitivity and understanding. Carlson’s piano sets each of Hixson’s vocals beautifully. This is one of those albums that you simply cannot hear enough."
--Joseph Lang, Jersey Jazz

"I love your version of Lotus Blossom and it's sweet of you to think of it as the high spot on the CD since the song is surrounded by such illustrious brethren. Personally, I think every cut is a highlight. First off, you have a lovely voice, one that seems to snuggle up beside a listener as it insinuates itself into the heart of a song. In that regard, you remind me of the late and much missed singer, Nancy Lamott. Rick's accompaniments are beautifully understated (he's not a busy pianist) and seem perfectly 'right.' You're a remarkable team."
--Roger Schore, lyricist

"I remembered driving home from a gig and hearing a track from Maud Hixson's new disc Love's Refrain, featuring just her with Rick Carlson at the piano. I would give that disc to anyone and everyone. I got goose bumps as I was listening on the way home that night. Everything about it is so absolutely right on, it's amazing! The piano is perfect and beautifully recorded. The piano playing is classic Rick Carlson: swinging and casual, understated and perfect. Maud sounds relaxed and has such command of her art. Her intonation and phrasing are immaculate. It's in the groove and polished, totally first class."
--Gordy Johnson, bassist

CDs available at performances as well as local and online retailers.
Click on titles to listen to clips and purchase online at CD Baby:

Love's Refrain (with Rick Carlson)

Let's Not Be Sensible! (with Arne Fogel and the Wolverines Quintet)

Small Batch (with Rick Carlson)

Local Retailers:

The Bibelot Shops (two Minneapolis locations, two St. Paul locations)
The Electric Fetus (Minneapolis)
The Minnesota History Center Museum Shop (St. Paul)

MP3s: (click links below to purchase)

CD Baby

iTunes Apple Store

Amazon.com

DVDs: (click links to order)

Baby Blue Arts Television Show (30mn.)

Live at the Times (with the Twin Cities Hot Club)

Streaming Video Performances: (click links to view)

YouTube ("Something To Live For" from Beyond Category concert)

YouTube ("In A Mellow Tone" from Beyond Category concert)

YouTube ("Lotus Blossom" from Beyond Category concert)

YouTube ("Don't You Know I Care" from Beyond Category concert)

YouTube ("I Didn't Know About You" from Beyond Category concert)

Baby Blue Arts Television (songs from Love's Refrain)

YouTube ("Chez Moi" with the Twin Cities Hot Club)