A mixed bag of big voices

Barbra Streisand

Back to Brooklyn

Although born and raised in Brooklyn, amazingly Barbra Streisand hasn't performed there in over three decades. It's no wonder the crowd goes wild in this rousing homecoming concert, recorded over two nights in October 2012. At 71, her voice has aged like fine wine and she shows off those impressive pipes from get-go in the showstopping opener, As If We Never Said Goodbye. Originally a number from the West End musical Sunset Boulevard, she turns it into a tribute anthem for her fellow Brooklyn-ites - something which she does a lot throughout the evening by altering the lyrics of some of the songs to namecheck her 'hood. The set comprises mostly of classics from the Great American Songbook (That Face; Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered; My Funny Valentine; Some Other Time) and guest stars like Chris Botti and her son Jason Gould drop in for duets. In Streisand's own words, the concert album is "a celebration of the music that (she) loves by the people that (she) knows"; Back to Brooklyn definitely delivers on that note even though the excessive stage banter between songs sometimes get in the way.