Grammy Nominated
Singer, Pianist, Composer
It was dusk in the desert, and the dimming December light set the mood of a New York supper club at closing time after all the customers had gone and the last cocktail glass cleared. The venue was actually Chris Bennett’s new digs: the historic Loretta Young estate in the “Deepwell” part of historic Palm Springs where singers from a bygone era like Julie London and Ginny Simms dwelled among Hollywood luminaries as fabled as William Holden and Elizabeth Taylor, once upon a yesterday.
Chris purchased the the prestigious "Villa Loretta" home from the two-time Academy Award-winning actress Loretta Young that she shared with her husband, Oscar-winning costume designer Jean Louis.
Christening it “Villa Loretta”, Chris has since transformed the large, elegant formal living room into an intimate event space that has hosted the likes of Diane Schuur, Jack Jones, Barry Manilow, and was also featured in a segment for the “Jimmie Kimmel Show”.
Tonight, it’s just Chris and Bill with a dozen ballads, a handful of their closest friends, and an extra bottle of wine as the sun sets behind the San Jacinto Mountains.
Images from recording "Something Wonderful" with Bill Marx.
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We didn’t know then that “Something Wonderful” would be the title cut of the 9 tunes selected from these sessions captured on that enchanted night, but it has since become Chris Bennett's new studio release and a departure from her standard CD releases which can vary from an 18-piece big band replete with strings to a four-piece jazz combo with backup singers and children’s choir.
This time it’s piano and voice, but the acoustic simplicity of the duo is what makes this project her most powerful work to date and also her most intimate. “Something Wonderful” is a collaboration with jazz giant, Bill Marx, heir to Hollywood royalty as the eldest son of Harpo Marx and nephew of Groucho Marx, of the legendary comedy family, the “Marx Brothers”.
A musical prodigy, it was the young Bill Marx who actually arranged his father’s most famous repertoire at the harp.
“I’m a composer who happens to play the piano; not a pianist who happens to compose,” he teases. He’s actually a musical genius, but tonight he’s accompanying Chris Bennett the way he used to play for Ann Richards, Esther Phillips, and Joanie Sommers in the 1960’s. Tonight it might as well be Nineteen-Sixty-Something. After all, Chris Bennett is time-traveling through the Great American Songbook with Marx as her pianist.
It’s a departure for another Midwestern gal from Illinois who — like June Christy, Anita O’Day and Helen Morgan before her, grew up on a musical diet of Big Band melodies and Broadway show tunes, destined to feast at the table of jazz where they were later feted.
A love of performing led to a passion for dance and, while in high school, Chris Bennett opened a dance studio at the age of 14. She danced her way through college majoring in dance education and performance and, soon after, headed to UCLA and California to pursue her musical dreams.
With a dancer’s skills and a vocalist’s talent, Chris Bennett was selected by Jim Nabors to join his Las Vegas revue that toured cross-country. Performing onstage every night in new venues, playing to fresh audiences in different cities, Chris Bennett headline her own shows across the globe. From choreographing her dancers to selecting the repertoire of her band, Chris incorporated contemporary pop covers and jazz standards in her shows.
By her mid-twenties, Chris was already a well-traveled celebrity and, certainly, a vocalist of the world. While on tour in Germany, she was scouted and hand- picked by multi-Grammy and multi-Academy Award winning composer/producer Giorgio Moroder to front the popular disco group “Munich Machine”.
Giorgio chose Chris to be the lead vocalist for their album which contain a dance version of the Procol Harum rock classic, "A Whiter Shade of Pale."
Chris not only recorded the entire album, but she also posed for the cover art. Chris's runway model body and movie star looks caused an international sensation and made for one of the highest charting and highest-grossing disco albums of 1978.
FEATURE FILM “MIDNIGHT EXPRESS”
Chris Bennett, was nominated for a GRAMMY AWARD along with GIORGIO MORODER for the THEME FROM MIDNIGHT EXPRESS from the ACADEMY AWARD winning film "MIDNIGHT EXPRESS."
A full-fledged dance music diva under the guidance of Moroder, Chris was signed to Casablanca Records as a songwriter and recording artist. She recorded as one half of Giorgio & Chris for the only duet album of Moroder’s entire career, Love’s In You, Love’s In Me.
She recorded as one half of
Giorgio & Chris for the only duet album of Moroder’s entire career, Love’s In You, Love’s In Me.
Chris co-wrote and co-produced for the “Three Degrees”, the final “Munich Machine"
album, Body Shine, and the Suzi Lane album, Ooh La La. She also played a key role in producing and writing with Grammy-award winning blues artist, Keb Mo.
The success of her concerts, CD sales, and consistent critical triumphs have led to sold-out performances throughout Europe, New York clubs, and Chicago cabarets. At home in Southern California, she continues to be a popular international solo artist who, when not on tour, keeps busy in her studio at “Villa Loretta” producing demos for her original Broadway show and recording tracks for a disco “super-group” made up of dance music divas. Jazz remains her primary calling card.
A humanitarian of the first order, Chris has also co-written and recorded a song in memory of Holocaust survivors Remember, as well as a song in support of marriage equality, Everybody Has The Right.
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Disco divas CHRIS BENNETT and PATTIE BROOKS, a duet on EVERYBODY HAS THE RIGHT, a pro-marriage-equality anthem.
Chris Bennett and her collaborator, Multi-Platinum Lyricist, Lisa-Catherine Cohen, (www.Lisa-Catherine.com), composed REMEMBER, a song for the Holocaust and the theme song for THE SURVIVOR MITZAH PROJECT.
They teamed with writer/producer, McKinley Marshall, for EVERYBODY HAS THE RIGHT, an anthem in support of Marriage Equality that was made to be an anthem for the WORLD BURN FOUNDATION.
An outspoken artist for social change and an advocate of community activism, locally and globally, Chris is often called upon to perform in the benefit of organizations such as SHARE,
The Torch Foundation, HoLa, and producing at her beautiful estate, Villa Loretta, for charity events like the Palm Springs Animal Shelter and benefits for the Palm Springs Symphony Orchestra.
From Disco Diva to Jazz Chanteause, the musical journey of Chris Bennett has been the evolution of an artist come full circle. An accomplished vocalist, pianist, composer, and producer, she adds her latest CD release to a catalog that includes a Christmas Jazz CD (When I Think of Christmas), a Latin Jazz CD (Until the End of Time), an all-girls CD (Girl Talk), and two live CDs recorded in Berlin (Once Upon A Time and Live in Berlin). The title cut of her last studio release, Sail Away, climbed the top of the i-Tunes singles charts in 2010 and remains her best-selling album to date.
This time, with Maestro Bill Marx at the piano and Chris Bennett at the microphone, the elegance and intimacy of their historic jazz collaboration is preserved on this new album, available now in CD format and as a digital download. And that’s something wonderful to hear.
- By David Ybarra
Chris Bennett’s compositions have been recorded by:
TINA TURNER
KEB MO
THE THREE DEGREES
THE MANHATTAN TRANSFER
LEON WARE
RANDY HALL
NINA STOREY
KEVIN KRAUS
among others.