Review: Frank Dain Commemorates Award Win With Encore of A CELEBRATION at Don't Tell Mama

In 2025, Cabaret Scenes Editor-in-Chief, Frank Dain, played his first solo cabaret show in over a decade (about fourteen years-ish), and the response was so great that the Bistro Awards offered him a 2026 honor for Outstanding Vocal Artistry and Cabaret Advocate (to be presented on March 16th).  Only Monday, he was nominated for a 2026 MAC Award in the Male Vocalist category.   It just so happens that the day before I was able to catch a one-night-only encore performance of the show that brought him back to the stage after so long, the title of which is A CELEBRATION 24 YEARS IN THE MAKING.  Observant readers will note that the timeline does not add up, for Mr. Dain’s absence from the stage is only 14 years and the title celebrates 24 years, and that is because what Frank Dain is celebrating is his first album in (you guessed it) 24 years.  The first album, I THOUGHT ABOUT YOU, was released in 2001, and its brand-new baby brother, I’VE HAD A LOVE, was released last year on Valentine’s Day.  So it has been a whirlwind time for Frank, whose years are already filled with the activity of helming the magazine that works in conjunction with The American Songbook Association to put a spotlight on the artform of cabaret.  But writing about art and creating it are two different experiences, and the happiness Mr. Dain is enjoying with his return to cabaret creation was all over his face for the entirety of his matinee performance at Don’t Tell Mama on Sunday.  Right now, Frank Dain is living in an extremely joyful moment, and he certainly has earned it.

For his seventy-minute musical cabaret, Mr. Dain makes a kind of bookend presentation of his recording career, flowing back and forth between songs from I Thought About You (like “The Way You Look Tonight” and “Night and Day”) and I’ve Had a Love (like “I’ll Be Easy to Find” and “I Didn’t Know What Time It Was”), while telling tales personal about his career and about his life.  With a comfortable air about him and an even more comfortable script from which to work, Dain is a genial gentleman with a story to tell, and a story worth listening to.  There is an essence about Mr. Dain that is actually a little absent from the cabaret stage these days, an elegance harkening back to artists from a bygone era, when men like Bobby Short and Mel Torme ruled these rooms; one might even go so far as to group him in with those nightclub men from the Sixties who wore black suits and skinny ties and crooned the classics.  The only thing is that, arriving hand-in-hand with that retro vibe of sophistication and style, is a modern slant into sharing one’s truth.  That wasn’t the thing back then.  Men did nightclub acts where the script wasn’t a script, it was off-the-cuff patter favoring jokes over substance, a little swing, a little balladeering, and compositions by the greats.  Frank Dain may have brought the spirit of the era with him into 2026, but, as a performer, he has evolved with the art form, entering into the scope of performances in this day and age.  Dain is comfortable standing at the microphone and recounting highly personal reminiscences from his life.  There is no fear of oversharing, for he has crafted his script in a manner that is honest without being gratuitous, and when he shares, he does so with what is possibly the biggest, most sincere smile you’ve ever seen, and, frequently, the slenderest rim of tear along his lower eyelid.  This is no nightclub act: this is cabaret at its finest form.  Honest.  Genuine.  Authentic.

It is also supremely musical.  

Frank Dain is a stunning vocalist.  He is also a stunning storyteller.  These two things do not always go hand-in-hand on the cabaret stage, and more’s the pity.  The world would be a better place if every person who stepped up onto that stage one foot off the ground were able to master the balance of vocal ability and natural public speaking, and anyone with a wish to play cabaret could learn a thing or two from Frank Dain.  He is, at all times, accessible and affable with his oration - then he segues into song and, surprise of surprises, he remains accessible.  There is no closing of the eyes, no avoiding the faces of the audience, and no private reverie, no cabaret party where the headliner forgot to invite the audience.  The emotion present during the monological portion of the evening carries over into wide-open and specific emotions played out in time with the music.  Dain’s interpretive skills are masterful, both in his acting and his vocals, and never, at any time, is he uncomfortable when not actively engaged in his singing.  If the exquisite (EXQUISITE) band (see their names below) is playing an instrumental break, Frank is content to remain where he is standing or sitting, floating in the emotion, and in the wisdom that the performance does not hit pause when the voice is granted a momentary break.  He is ALL about the telling of the story, from first to last notes.  It is breathtaking, it is heartwarming, it is wildly refreshing.

As for the quality of Frank Dain’s vocals, this writer found himself puzzled by a couple of comments, possibly scripted, possibly off-the-cuff, about the changing tides (and tones) of his voice, as time has gone by.  He paid honor to Musical Director Kathleen Landis for her adjustment of some keys and some musical phrasing to accommodate him and his 2026 voice… except that I noticed no need for special arrangements of any sort.  There was no evidence of vocal diminishment, of any kind.  Frank Dain has a lovely, a pleasing, a pretty voice that can handle up-tempos and ballads, low notes and high notes, tenderness and tumult, but, more to the point, he has a knack for bringing every composition to him, a manner in which he melds the words and the music to his whim, making them work for him and with him.  He is in complete control of the material, at all times (aided mightily by his arrangements, some by Landis, some by the late Rick Jensen, who worked on the first album).  This is the artistry and proficiency that wins awards, while winning hearts.

Musical highlights during the program (for this writer, at least) were a bold and grounded “I Cover The Waterfront,” a unique and hypnotic “Unusual Way,” an “It Never Was You” that resonated as a musical heartbeat would, and a “Sleepy Man” that was, alone, worth the price of admission.  But the emotional anchor of the performance was that which brought the program to its close.  It was rightly mapped out by Dain, director Lennie Watts, and artistic consultant (and vocal coach to Dain) Kurt Peterson.  Throughout the proceedings, Frank spoke often of his late husband, Bill, (the two were together for a total of thirty-three years), but at the end of the show, Frank spoke about the loss felt by Bill’s passing, as well as the joy he had for those thirty three years, concluding the monologue with a deeply felt “Hello, Young Lovers,” from whence cometh the title of the recent recording.  Overcome with emotion, tears and a shaking voice, Mr. Dain powered through, delivering musical greatness and storytelling realness for his appreciative audience, an audience that held him in their hearts as he held them in the palm of his hand, before bringing it all home with an extremely appropriate “Some Other Time.”  It was a perfect ending to a cabaret show that could be called textbook, but only to a certain degree, for, while A CELEBRATION 24 YEARS IN THE MAKING absolutely stands as an example of how to produce and perform a letter perfect cabaret, it is also so unique to Frank Dain, to his life story, to his artistic aesthetic, that an attempt to put it in a category with other shows would be futile, for it stands, completely and totally, in a class all its own.  Rather like Frank Dain himself.

Visit the Frank Dain website HERE, the Cabaret scenes website HERE, and Frank’s Spotify page HERE.

Find great shows to see on the Don’t Tell Mama website HERE.

The A CELEBRATION band is Boots Maleson on Bass, Peter Calo on Guitar, and Musical Director/arranger Kathleen Landis on Piano.

Photos by Stephen Mosher