'Moon River', dad and me

By WILLIAM DART

"I hear I'm supposed to bring a sweater," is Monica Mancini's first quip. The American jazz singer has just played at the Montreux Jazz Festival and, after "one day recuperating and one day at home, we're off to see you".

Home, I find out, is Los Angeles, "a sort of island, like a bunch of Martians landed in the spot, and I love it. It's just this great breeding ground for musicians."

On Saturday, Monica Mancini and the Auckland Philharmonia give us a taste of the classiest breeding that LA can offer when she headlines a tribute to her father, Henry, and his lyricist Johnny Mercer.

Mancini is known, perhaps over-known, for the jaunty theme from The Pink Panther and the bittersweet Moon River, although Mancini fanatics have long lists of cherished songs and soundtracks.

His daughter will be singing favourites on Saturday, with Moon River, Days of Wine and Roses and Charade, although she's cagey when I ask her whether the last song will have the classic calliope styling. "You're gonna have to listen to it and see for yourself. You can't explain everything," Mancini says. But within seconds she relents, saying that she is using "this really cool arrangement by Dad, a samba with a driving beat. You're gonna love it".

We continue to talk through Saturday's songs and she singles out Two for the Road as "a family fave and my father's favourite. His colleagues have referred to it as perfect in structure".

Analysis stops there, but as someone who sat dumbstruck during Victor Victoria while Blake Edwards' camera moved 360 degrees around Julie Andrews singing Crazy World, I ask why we're not getting this gorgeous number. "Isn't that strange, we've just replaced it with When October Goes because that's on my latest record. Crazy World is like a little piece of theatre and a beautiful moment in the film. Gee, I might have to resurrect that one."

The problem is, I'm told - and Mancini's Cinema Paradiso CD is prime evidence of this - "a programme can become ballad-heavy, and we started to replace them. I don't want people falling asleep".

Fear not, there will be some upbeat numbers in the concert. Le Jazz Hot from Victor Victoria is one, and I suggest that Dorothy Provine's bar-room belter He Shouldn't-A, Hadn't-A, Oughtn't-A Swang On Me from The Great Race might have balanced The Sweetheart Tree from the same film. "Boy, you really are a fan, aren't you?" Mancini counters. "That would be a toe-tapper. Gee, I'm taking to heart these suggestions!"

Monica Mancini paints a pretty placid picture of life in the Mancini household. "We were about 12 or 13 before he really made it big with Breakfast at Tiffany's, so we had a normal upbringing. He'd go to work and my mum would go to work. It's just that it was different to most people going to work.

"Ours wasn't a star-studded home by any means. My dad hung out with the jazz people, David Rose, Pete Rugolo and Stan Kenton and shied away from the movie star stuff."

The young Monica was not always aware of the celebrity status of family friends. "When Johnny Mercer would come over to socialise I was too young to appreciate who he was. I wish I'd been little bit more aware at the time so I could have ogled a bit more," she sighs, adding as an afterthought, "The one that really blew me away was Sean Connery - we made sure we got a picture with him."

It was her mother, Ginny, who inspired her to get into the music business. "We all sang as youngsters and every now and then Dad would stick us in his chorus. But my mother was a studio singer, working in all the TV shows of the time. I would go with her to work after school and I thought, this is what I want to do. It was her who put me on the path to singing. It wasn't Dad - if you ever heard him singing you wouldn't think I got it from him."

Melody comes first with Mancini, "especially these days when music is so unmelodic". I'm put on the spot when she asks, "Is music unmelodic out there in New Zealand?" but I sidestep by asking why it is that so few rock musicians have taken to the Mancini classics with deconstructionist hatchets. "Aha," is the response, "There is a group called Saliva! (thank you very much) which recently redid the theme from Peter Gunn, which has been popular with the young."

Perhaps Mancini would be a Saliva! fan if she were 20. When she was that age, it was the male singers that stood out for her. "I always liked the guys, especially Matt Monroe and Bobby Darin. Simon and Garfunkel, Joni Mitchell and Linda Ronstadt, those are the people I wore out. And the Beatles of course. But Bobby Darin's a hero of mine. I just listen to him and want to sing. He has an energy that's inspiring.

"They're now doing a story of his life and my husband, Greg Field, is going to be doing some music for the project. Kevin Spacey is starring as Bobby, so Greg was giving him drum lessons. Kevin's going to play all his own stuff. So maybe the story will be told what a great musician he was."

In the meantime, there's family business to be taken care of at the Aotea Centre this weekend, and Henry Mancini will be the man of the moment. A smooth time is promised, tied up with velvet strings, jazzy piano and the sultry voice of Monica Mancini.

Performance

* What: A Tribute to Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer

* Where and when: Aotea Centre, Saturday, 8pm