Review: Nicole Zuraitis’ ‘Live at Vic’s Las Vegas’

Go ahead and try this – Ask your friends who the most prominent female jazz vocalists have been in the past five years. Or, do a Google search with the question. More often than not, you won’t find Nicole Zuraitis’s name on the list. That’s criminal. Consider the Grammy Awards. Samara Joy has won five Grammys, and Cecile McLorin Salvant three. Although yet to win, Jazzmeia Horn has been nominated thrice. Zuraitis has herself won two –  Best Jazz Vocal Album for How Love Begins (La Reserve, 2024) and,  year later, Best Large Jazz Ensemble for Bianca Reimagined: Music for Paws and Persistence (Outside in Music, 2024). Yet, you do not hear her name as often as the others though she is arguably as talented – across her singing, composing, arranging and piano playing –  as them all. All her talents are on vivid display on Live at Vic’s Las Vegas (La Reserve, 2025) from which she could be poised for yet another win. The album is that strong!

Live at Vic’s bristles with joy and energy as Zuraitis interprets jazz, pop, and other genres in an inventive mix of covers and originals. The trained opera singer not only displays her vast vocal range and acute phrasing, but also her creative arrangements. She performs with her long-running band of partner and drummer Dan Pugach, guitarist Idan Morim, and bassist Samuel Weber, alongside special guests Keyon Harrold (trumpet), Tom Scott (saxophone), and Rachel Eckroth (organ). The album was issued as a double LP with sixteen tracks. The CD version is culled from the performance with eleven, skipping “Round Midnight,” “Georgia on My Mind,” “Right In Front of Me,” “Reverie,” and “Sea Line Woman.”

The CD begins with the 1956 R&B hit turned Blues standard, “I Got My Mojo Working,” written by Ann Cole and popularized by Muddy Waters. Yet, as you listen, Zuraitis’s arrangement puts so much swing into the tune that one would not likely guess its origins. Eckroth’s organ and Scott’s – Yes, the Tom Scott who once worked with Joni Mitchell – saxophone bolster the tune. Usually, “The Nearness of You” is rendered as a tender ballad as on Michael Brecker’s album of the same name. Yet, Zuraitis makes it swing, infusing it with plenty of energy, as she scats, and gives improvising room for guitarist Morim and bassist Weber. The original “All Stars Lead to You” runs past eleven minutes as Harold and Scott improvise their way through dynamic solos, driven by the steady hand of drummer Pugach.

Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” is quickly becoming a favorite for jazz musicians. Parlor Greens even did a version at the 2025 Newport Jazz Festival. Here, Zuraitis takes a reflective piano intro, slowing the tempo of the song to make it far more dramatic and wildly different from Parton’s bouncy tune. Harold steps in for an emotive solo, and Zuraitis’s vocal range is stratospheric. The also increasingly covered “Pure Imagination,” from Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory (Wolper, 1971) is taken in mellow form with Zuraitis on electric piano in duet with Morim on guitar as she sings with incredibly dreamy vocals. Another original is “Middle C,” co-written with Billy Seidman, a blend of old school jazz – including a ‘40s style Scott solo – with clever lyrics – “.You’re the do, in do-re-me. Baby, you’re my middle C.”  

The audience is fully engaged throughout the live outing but perhaps most so on the song Zuraitis says she learned from Oleta Adams and Quincy Jones, the Bernard Ighner standard “Everything Must Change.” She takes the first verse duetting with Morim, much like they did on “Pure Imagination,” before the full band joins on the second verse, where the tune hits a groove and the band swells (perhaps too much) behind her powerful pipes. “The Coffee Song” features some humorous banter and it’s refreshing to see that not all is serious business. Zuraitis and the band deftly handle Stevie Nicks’ “Rhiannon” in yet another powerhouse vocal performance imbued by Morim’s dazzling guitar. 

 As strong as many of these arrangements are, Zuraitis’s treatment of “Wichita Lineman” is arguably the most brilliant of all. Tom Scott takes an impressive, bluesy solo, as does Morim. Zuraitis scats playfully to match Pugach’s rhythms, and the band surprisingly ends abruptly. The closer, “Do I Move You,” is usually associated with Nina Simone’s tender and sensuous rendering. Zuriatis, as is her wont, takes it in a different direction, turning it into a syncopated blues featuring her bright piano and commanding voice alongside Eckroth’s swirling organ.

Zuraitis shows versatility, power, and creativity. What more could we ask for? Her talents are off the charts.

‘Nicole Zuraitis & Friends Live at Vic’s Las Vegas’ is out now on La Reserve. It can be purchased on Bandcamp.