The daughter of the jazz singer, educator and author Stephanie Nakasian and the late jazz pianist Hod O'Brien, Veronica Swift has been on jazz vocal fans' radars ever since she earned second place in the 2015 Thelonious Monk Institute International Jazz Competition. Displaying power and impeccable time, emotional depth and timbral beauty, first-rate arranging skills and a storytelling gift, Swift's debut for Mack Avenue is nothing short of spectacular. Album opener, André and Dory Previn's You're Gonna Hear From Me’, presents an effervescently swinging clarion call, while Swift's ability to effortlessly sustain the melodic line comes strongly to the fore in Pete Rugolo's drop-dead gorgeous ‘Interlude’. With her own gear-changing ‘I Hope She Makes You Happy’, Swift shows that she's clearly no slouch in the composition department, while the singer's mash-up of the Arthur Schwartz/Howard Dietz-penned ‘Confession’ with Jessie Mae Robinson's ‘The Other Woman’ (first recorded by Nina Simone) is a standout, adroitly exploring the same theme from two different perspectives. Penned by Bob Dorough and Dave Frishberg and containing one of the greatest couplets in jazz (“Cause I'm cool as a cuke, I'm a cat, I'm a card, I'm a kook”, the second line slightly reordered here by Swift), the singer delivers a suitably rollicking ‘I'm Hip’. Brilliantly accompanied by two distinctive piano trios led by pianists Benny Green and Emmet Cohen respectively, Confessions is one of the year's most affecting vocal jazz releases.