Nightlife Award Winner Marilyn Maye

Marilyn Maye is a singer on the move. In any given week, she could be singing in Las Vegas or Palm Springs, Florida or Philly. It's nothing new to her: when she began singing on the Tonight Show, she had to be flown in from Kansas City for every performance. But it was her hit tribute to the late "Tonight Show" host Johnny Carson at New York City's own Metropolitan Room that earned her a Nightlife Award for Outstanding Cabaret Vocalist in a Major Engagement, which she will accept on Monday at Town Hall.

A tribute to a TV talk show host may not seem the most obvious subject matter for a cabaret, but for Marilyn Maye, it was a return to her roots. "It brought national recognition to me, and opened up a world of engagements," she recalls. "It was wonderful to be able to get that kind of exposure nationally, and certainly, the world did look at the show. He was so complimentary to me," she continues, and described Carson's support and encouragement "invaluable." Before Carson made the show his own, Maye was a regular guest during Steve Allen's tenure. "I was flying from this little club out to do a national television show, the Steve Allen show, and then I would go back to Kansas City and work this little room," she says. "I did five nights a week for all those years. And on the last show before Steve went off the air, an executive from RCA saw me. And it was kind of last chance, you know? He said, 'I want to record you, do a major album with you.'" That album, "Meet Marvelous Marilyn Maye/The Lamp is Low," featured arrangements by Don Costa and Manny Albam, and was backed a full orchestra. "It was really just amazing," Maye says. "If they hadn't seen me on that last show..." Her voice trails off, and she chuckles dryly.

The journey to the Metropolitan Room was inspired by Billy Stritch, a frequent collaborator of Maye's in her midwest concerts.  "When he opened the Met Room, he said, 'Boy, this is a good room for you, too.'" Maye recalls. "That's what drew me back after 17 years... But I worked it for only one night in October of '06, and I thought there'd be four people there. I thought there'd just be friends that I know, that knew I was going to be there, and I was absolutely overwhelmed when the house was packed and there were people lined up on the street to get in. I was just overwhelmed. And it's still overwhelming."

"I never was retired," Maye continues. "The word 'retirement' is not in my vocabulary. I have worked in the middle-west where people know my name and where I can draw a full house. That's the most important thing: I remained in the middle-west and have continued to work. There didn't seem to be the right situation for me in New York until this Metropolitan Room."

That "right situation" earned her a Nightlife Award. "I'm honored," Maye says about her win. "It's very nice that they've chosen my work this year. It's a validation of my work.When there's that many critics that choose you for what you've done, that's a validation of what you do. I think that's wonderful...  I'm glad that they've chosen my work, because I'm certainly a mature performer (I won't use the word "old!"), and it's nice that this has happened to me while I'm still here to receive it. Thank God my health is good!" she laughs. She describes the award as "important, because it's the critics" who choose the winners and runners-up. "The audience approval, and the fact that you bring people in, is very important," she says. "If you don't do business, there is no business, and it is a business. It's not my hobby. It is a very important business. I've never done anything but this. It's very important that we have people in the seats. But the approval of the critics is important to us performers. Without that approval, people don't read about you and they don't know that you're doing something good. And when the critics say it's good, I think that does bring in people. So all of that is most valuable to me."

As for herself, Marilyn Maye is happy to still be an in-demand performer. "I just think we do songs that, hopefully, the people enjoy and they go out having had a really good time," she says thoughtfully. "That's my job, to entertain, and to sing songs that maybe they can identify with, and that something hits home with them and hits their lives... It's always a party when I work for the audience, and I'm very thrilled that the audience loves what I do. I guess that's my greatest accomplishment, that the audience does love what I do. I'm a working singer."

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