Various Artists - MusiCares Tribute to Barbra Streisand, Los Angeles Convention Center, Los Angeles, CA, 2-11-2011

I have to be honest: I've never been a fan of Barbra Streisand's music. It's too show tune theatrical for me. But I'm planning to post all the MusiCares tributes I could find, and this was the next one to randomly get chosen for posting. And hearing the likes of Seal, Stevie Wonder, and Beck perform her songs help make this more palatable for me.

As with virtually all the MusiCares tribute concerts I post, the only reason we have worthy sound quality recordings of them is because some of them were released on DVD (but not in any audio format). This is another one of those lucky ones. I converted it from video to audio, then broke it into mp3s.

Unfortunately, in this case, it seems to have been edited down, though I don't know how much is missing. One thing that was definitely missing here though was her acceptance speech. I figured there had to have been one, so I did some searching. I couldn't find it, but I did find a few snippets from it, with some of her songs loudly playing in the background (which obviously wasn't played like that in the concert). I used MVSEP to remove the music but keep the talking and the applause. Then I arranged what I had. Clearly, that's not all of it. But I figure some of it is better than nothing. Hopefully more of it will emerge, plus whatever else was left off the DVD.

By the way, it was interesting that Prince, of all people, was the one to introduce her before her acceptance speech. That same recording of her speech included him saying a few words, so I put that in here as well, after removing the background music. However, I don't know if his short comments are complete or not. So that's why the Streisand's speech and Prince's introduction both have "[Edit]" in their titles.

As is typical for these things, the recipient of the award performed a couple of songs at the end of the concert. That's exactly what Streisand did here.  

Oh, one more thing. An unusual track here is from comedian and talk show host Bill Maher, since it was just comments about her instead of music. He also had some political jokes, but they were only relevant in 2011 politics, and they didn't have anything to do with Streisand anyway, so I cut those out. That's why that track has "[Edit]" in its title. 

Here's a Rolling Stone Magazine link with very little text but lots of photos from the event:

2011 MusiCares Person of the Year Tribute to Barbra Streisand 

This album is an hour and three minutes long. 

01 talk (Diana Krall)
02 Down with Love (Diana Krall)
03 Guilty (Seal)
04 Somewhere (Leona Lewis)
05 My Man (Lea Michele)
06 On a Clear Day [You Can See Forever] - Lazy Afternoon (Herbie Hancock & Nikki Yanofsky)
07 talk [Edit] (Bill Maher)
08 Come Rain or Come Shine (LeAnn Rimes, Jeff Beck & BeBe Winans)
09 Send in the Clowns (Faith Hill)
10 One Less Bell to Answer - A House Is Not a Home (Kristin Chenoweth & Matthew Morrison)
11 Memory (Barry Manilow)
12 Smile (Tony Bennett)
13 People (Stevie Wonder & Arturo Sandoval)
14 talk [Edit] (Prince)
15 talk [Edit] (Barbra Streisand)
16 Windmills of Your Mind (Barbra Streisand)
17 The Promise [I'll Never Say Goodbye] (Barbra Streisand) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ndNRYeAj

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/Bxx0HNXUQhayQxK/file

The cover image is from this exact concert.

Various Artists - MusiCares Tribute to Carole King, Los Angeles Convention Center, Los Angeles, CA, 1-24-2014

I recently started posting MusiCares tribute concerts. Here's another one. This one honors singer-songwriter Carole King, from 2014.

I've celebrated King's music on this blog quite a bit already. For instance, she and her songwriting partner Gerry Goffin are the subject of six albums in the "Covered" series. If there's an award for songwriting, she probably has gotten it, since she's written more hit songs than just about anybody on the planet. Oh, and her 1971 album "Tapestry" has sold over 15 million copies, making it one of the best selling albums of all time, as well as appearing in the Number 25 spot in Rolling Stone Magazine's list of the top 500 albums of all time. Not to shabby. 

This follows the usual format of such benefit concerts. Lost of guest stars performed their versions of King's songs. Then King gave an acceptance speech. Then she played a few songs at the end of the concert. She had a particularly close relationship with James Taylor, going back to the early 1970s, so it's not too surprising that Taylor dueted with her on most of those final songs.

The music here has not been released in audio format. However, it has come out on a DVD. That's how we have a recording, since these MusiCares concerts generally haven't been bootlegged at all. I converted the DVD to audio format, then broke the music into mp3s. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is an hour and 39 minutes long.

01 talk (emcee)
02 Hi De Ho [That Old Sweet Roll] (LeAnn Rimes & Steven Tyler)
03 So Far Away (Pink with Paul Mirkovich)
04 I Feel the Earth Move (Train)
05 talk (Lady Gaga)
06 You've Got a Friend (Lady Gaga)
07 talk (Gloria Estefan)
08 It's Too Late (Gloria Estefan)
09 talk (will.i.am)
10 Love Makes the World - Where Is the Love (will.i.am & Leah McFall)
11 Beautiful (Sara Bareilles, Zac Brown, Jason Mraz & Raining Jane)
12 Way Over Yonder (Merry Clayton, Lisa Fischer, Judith Hill & Darlene Love)
13 talk (Joy)
14 Where You Lead (Jesse & Joy)
15 Crying in the Rain (Miguel & Kacey Musgraves)
16 talk (Alicia Keys)
17 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Alicia Keys)
18 Been to Canaan (Jennifer Nettles)
19 I'm into Something Good (Amy Grant)
20 It Might as Well Rain until September (Miranda Lambert)
21 One Fine Day (Martina McBride)
22 Up on the Roof (James Taylor)
23 talk (Neil Portnow)
24 talk (Carole King)
25 Home Again (Carole King, Moez Dawad & Ahmad A. El Haggar)
26 Sweet Seasons (Carole King & James Taylor)
27 talk (Carole King & James Taylor)
28 Hey Girl (Carole King & James Taylor)
29 talk (Carole King & James Taylor)
30 Will You Love Me Tomorrow (Carole King & James Taylor)
31 talk (Carole King)
32 Jazzman (Carole King & Tom Scott)
33 I Feel the Earth Move (Carole King & Everyone) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/LE6zAFv4

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/Qi10lCVRGcuAGWH/file

The album cover image is from this exact concert. From left to right: James Taylor, Zac Brown, Carole King, Sara Bareilles, and Jennifer Nettles. (I'm not counting the bald headed man behind King. I don't know who he is.)

Various Artists - Gershwin Prize for Popular Song Honoring Billy Joel, D.A.R. Constitution Hall, Washington, DC, 11-19-2014

Here's another "Gershwin Prize for Popular Song" award concert. This one from 2014 honors Billy Joel.

This follows the usual format of these concerts. First, some guest stars performed cover versions of songs by the honoree. Then there was an award presentation, and a speech by the honoree. Finally, the honoree performed a couple of songs to end the concert. There were a couple of twists this time, however. One is that the person to give a speech leading to Joel's speech was none other than Sonia Sotomayor, one of the justices of the U.S. supreme court. That's pretty unusual behavior for a supreme court justice, but I guess she must be a really big Billy Joel fan. The other twist is that Joel played five of his own songs, instead of the usual two or three.

It's unfortunate that the emcee for the concert was Kevin Spacey, due to his sex scandals that pretty much destroyed his career. But those scandals weren't reported on until 2017, three years after this concert. Another disappointment is that Paul McCartney didn't actually perform a song. Instead, he just sent a video message praising Joel. I noticed he would do the exact same thing for the Gershwin Prize concert for Elton John and Bernie Taupin in 2024.

Sadly, this may be the last of these Gershwin concerts I post until I can find more of them. I have most of the concert honoring Burt Bacharach, but I'm missing a couple of songs, so I'm still waiting on posting that. Otherwise, if anyone has any of the others, please let me know so I can share them. That especially goes for the two (Carole King and Smokey Robinson) that seem to only be available to people who pay for a PBS pass that's only available in you live in Wisconsin.

This album is an hour and three minutes long.

01 talk (Kevin Spacey)
02 The Longest Time (Boyz II Men)
03 Lullaby [Goodnight, My Angel] (LeAnn Rimes)
04 It's Still Rock and Roll to Me (Gavin DeGraw)
05 talk (emcee)
06 She's Always a Woman (Josh Groban with Sharon Isbin)
07 talk (Michael Feinstein)
08 She's Got a Way (Natalie Maines)
09 talk (John Mellencamp)
10 Allentown (John Mellencamp)
11 talk (Paul McCartney)
12 talk (emcee)
13 New York State of Mind (Tony Bennett)
14 talk (Sonia Sotomayor)
15 talk (Billy Joel)
16 Movin' Out [Anthony's Song] (Billy Joel)
17 Vienna (Billy Joel)
18 talk (Billy Joel)
19 Miami 2017 [I've Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway] (Billy Joel)
20 You May Be Right (Billy Joel)
21 talk (Kevin Spacey)
22 Piano Man (Billy Joel & Everyone [Edit])

https://pixeldrain.com/u/zGtLvUp6

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/cQJZPngXIkAhzJX/file

The cover photo is from this exact concert. I'm not sure who the two men behind him are. If anyone knows, let me know so I can add that information.

Chris Isaak - Change Your Mind - Non-Album Tracks (1996-2007)

It's strange, but I actually prefer these Chris Isaak stray tracks collections I've made more than most of his studio albums. That's the same with Norah Jones for me. I suspect it's because these artists stick to certain expectations and styles on their own albums, but let their hair down and do more varied things when it comes to stray tracks.

This album is a case in point. It still has that distinctive Chris Isaak sound. Many of the songs are originals, and it sets a sad, romantic mood much of the time. Yet he covers a bunch of interesting songs from Cheap Trick ("I Want You to Want Me") to Judy Garland ("Over the Rainbow")!

All but three of the songs here are officially released. Six come from B-sides. Another is from a best of, and most of the rest are from soundtracks or various artists compilations. The two unreleased ones are "Get Rhythm" - from a TV tribute to Johnny Cash, "Devil in Disguise" - from a TV tribute to Elvis Presley, and an acoustic band version of "Solitary Man" - from a concert broadcast on TV. All three of those TV sources sound better than most bootlegs, so there's high sound quality all through this album.

I have one more stray tracks album from him to post. Then I have some acoustic stuff from him.

This album is 44 minutes long.

01 Change Your Mind (Chris Isaak)
02 The Little White Cloud that Cried (Chris Isaak)
03 I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry (Chris Isaak)
04 Eyes of Texas (Chris Isaak)
05 So Lovely Is the Night (Chris Isaak)
06 Everyone Gets Down (Chris Isaak)
07 Fast N' Slow (Chris Isaak)
08 Get Rhythm (Chris Isaak)
09 Winter Waves (Chris Isaak)
10 It Wouldn't Be the Same without You (Chris Isaak)
11 Devil in Disguise (Chris Isaak & LeAnn Rimes)
12 Besame Mucho (Chris Isaak)
13 Solitary Man [Acoustic Band Version] (Chris Isaak)
14 I Want You to Want Me (Chris Isaak)
15 Over the Rainbow (Chris Isaak & Jerry Lee Lewis)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15129166/ChrisIsk_1996-2007_ChangeYourMindVariousSongs_atse.zip.html

The cover image comes from a concert poster from this time period. It was rectangular shaped, as most posters are, but I cropped the bottom portion, and brought the bottom jagged edge up.