This week, singer/pianist Harry Bacharach, who holds down Mondays and Thursdays at the Velvet Tango Room in Ohio City, will be starting a series of Friday evening gigs from 5-8 p.m. on the patio at Nighttown in Cleveland Heights.
Bacharach’s specialty is airy, spirited versions of pop classics by composers ranging from Cole Porter to Tom Waits, and his own clever, good-humored compositions that have classic pop-jazz feel. He showcased his sound on a CD Live From the Velvet Tango Room released last August.
This Friday he’ll be joined at Nighttown by his co-producer/engineer and trumpet/flugelhorn player on that album, Josh Rzepka, an Oberlin Conservatory graduate who began his master’s studies at Boston University last fall.
In a switch from his usual intimate performances, Bacharach will be playing at Cain Park’s Alma Theater at 7 p.m. on June 12 with a seven-piece ensemble that also includes Rzepka, sax players Dan Wagner and Jim Cirillo, trombonist B.J. Bishop, bassist Demetrius Steinmetz and drummer Roy King. Tickets for that show are $20 advance, $23 day of show. —Anastasia Pantsios
