Liz McNicholl knows to use her pipes.

Washing dishes early Thursday morning in that soft mental state between dreaming and waking, I listened to Liz McNicholl's debut 2002 CD, Grand Central Station. There are soundtracks that belong to certain moments in our lives, and, in this case, early morning seemed just right. The Irish singer's voice is a gentle awakening, the first strokes of dawn filtering through the window shade. The previous night McNicholl and her group performed at SoNo Caffeine, and I arrived several clock strokes too late, but in time to see the crowd still bustling. For a coffee shop surrounded by jumping bars, they had pulled good numbers. McNicholl, I'm sure, had a lot to do with the turnout. Mixing traditional, popular and original songs, each track on the CD lifts with real emotional investment. It's the kind of sincerity I recognized immediately having sat through all those rounds of the Danbury Idol contest, when I became particularly attuned to the inflections and dynamics of a singer's voice. With McNicholl's lilt and subtlety, Stevie Nicks' "Landslide," is less rock and more lost love ballad, the Sarah McLaughlin song "Angel" is an out-and-out tearjerker swelling in fragile beauty, and Sting's "Fields of Gold" has been transformed into a wistful Irish song of the countryside.

Her originals, like the title track, "Grand Central Station," cross somewhere between country and Celtic. In that song, she makes commuting sound like a fabulous adventure, saying, "Seeing the city in a different light / Everything's gonna be OK / I wish I could bottle these feelings / Save it for those rainy days." The CD features a good many notable musicians whose instrumental touches add to McNicholl's guitar strumming, including Gabriel Donohue on everything from keyboard to slide guitar to banjo and Joannie Madden from Cherish the Ladies on tin whistle and flute. It's a shame, considering the music's softness, that a man living upstairs from SoNo Caffeine has been making a ruckus over noise levels. Apparently, he's been griping for some time, even though the cozy venue offers mostly acoustic acts who would be hard put to "turn it down." McNicholl said she'll have to consider whether or not to return there. As she remarked, focusing on the volume level became a bit distracting. Originally from Co. Meath, Ireland, but now living in Norwalk, McNicholl will certainly be playing other gigs in the area regardless, and, fortunately, on the CD, she didn't have to hold back at all.

Use our contact form to write to Brita Brundage.