Mercedes was featured in The Boulevard June - July 2008, by Jason Feinberg
Imagine a warm night in the city, the empty streets wet after a late evening rain. You walk into the jazz club and ease into your chair while ordering up your favorite poison. The tables are lit with candles, the small stage illuminated with blue lights gleaming off the Steinway. The only thing missing from yesterday is the haze from smokers puffing away. Then it starts… the brushes against the snare and cymbal… the plucking of the string bass accompanied by the black and white keys. It all comes together while you are taken back in time with the sounds of Mercedes Hall. Little did I know when I first met Mercedes Hall that I would quickly become friends with her and her family. To say they are wonderful and talented people would be a disservice, as well as an understatement. In their presence, you are guaranteed to have wonderful laughs and long-lasting conversations with people that are genuinely great in every way. Mercedes' journey began in Boston and is filled with courage, passion, fear and a great love story. As Mercedes says, “My career started when I came out of the womb, I don’t remember doing anything else.” Her mother, a classically trained pianist, and her father, a self-taught musician, who were both gifted with beautiful voices, encouraged her in every way. She listened to every genre of music: jazz, R&B, pop, Latin, and was greatly influenced by the Motown era. “When I was 15, I wasn’t into the Beatles, I was listening to Nancy Wilson, Etta James, Ella Fitzgerald.” Timi Yuro, considered to be one of the first blue-eyed soul stylists, was at the top of Mercedes' list of inspirations. It was the distinctive-style vocalists that were her passion. They had soul. It was at this point that Mercedes knew this was the avenue she wanted to pursue and in the mid '60s she got her first professional job. As she says, “The rest is history.” By the late '60s Mercedes had done it all. She was garnering great reviews and had played all the best venues. There wasn’t anything more. So she left Boston and headed west with her young son, Michael. Being a newly divorced single mother away from her family was extremely unsettling. Mercedes decided that “If I’m going to have a second chapter in my life after this divorce and starting over, I have to do something that makes sense. I had some contacts and plans laid out for me in Las Vegas and Arizona. I never thought I would be entertaining in Las Vegas wearing hot pants and go-go boots! But there I was on stage and who was there in the audience to see me? Gladys Knight’s Pips and their manager, and Aretha Franklin’s brother and sister!" Soon enough Mercedes moved on and found herself working in LA getting great reviews from legendary jazz musician and musical journalist Leonard Feather. This landed her on the Merv Griffin show. Shortly thereafter, she found herself in a managerial dispute, not unlike so many other entertainers starting out. Musical venues came easy, but a single mom building her career and raising her child, alone, away from family was certainly a struggle. “What was I doing here? I never once called home to ask for someone to bail me out.” Scarier then LA was Mercedes' move to NY. "In LA, everyone has a pool, the weather is warm, you just feel like you’re doing well." Even though they were closer to family, the Big Apple closed in and the fear of failure lurked in the darkness. Her son, now 5, made her realize that she had to set her limits and make sure that this was it. “You see those [billboard] posters out there? People thought I had the best PR firm behind me, but it was me. I had a small group of friends and we went around and hung up posters promoting me.” This paid off as Mercedes made a name for herself. She moved to the Upper West Side, but soon realized that it was not going to work out having a roommate. "I didn’t want to invest too much and live beyond my means,” she says, so she found a small apartment a block away, perfect for her and Michael. Fate would meet up with Mercedes at Reno Sweeney’s, one of NY’s top performance clubs. “It was after hearing Linda Hopkins play … I went home and sat down thinking if I could only have a piano player like the one that was playing tonight. No sooner then I said that, guess who walked right by the window and ended up living right across the street? 'Didn’t I see you play last night for Linda Hopkins?' I asked him. I introduced myself and invited him up for coffee and tapes and the rest is history.” Lanny Meyers and Mercedes built a great working relationship that lasted over 30 years. “It was really fun, I liked those days, they were challenging, it was a good time for me in my life.” One day, her young son came home from school and said he wanted to go on an acting audition. She asked why, to which he replied, “I like this girl in my class and she’s going out for commercials after school.” “I thought, 'Oh great, it’s hard enough getting favors for photographs.' I didn’t want to ask for favors unless he was going to be sincere.” Her support of her son, getting him auditions and guiding and managing him would eventually lead to him becoming one of the most iconic teenage movie stars of all time. Anthony Michael Hall became a household name in the 1980s as an original member of the Brat Pack. Mercedes watched her son excel, and she and his sister joined him in The Breakfast Club, playing his mother and sister, respectively. One night when she went to see Red Foxx at NY’s Copacabana, she met a man named Tom Chestaro. “While I had dated some great guys, something always said…not yet.” Unbeknownst to Mercedes, Cupid was at play on this night as a mutual friend had plans to set her and Tom up. "I just got back from Acapulco and I was tan, all dressed up and I was looking HOT, baby!” When I first saw his eyes, I wrote a song, “Charity's Heart, Honesty's Eyes” and [it] was then that I had my eye on him and it never left." They talked after the show and Tom asked Mercedes if he could call her, but warned her that he worked crazy hours and it might be a few days. A few days later, there was no call. Mercedes decided to play the jealousy card. As she walked into the Copa again, Tommy saw her right away and he continues to tell the story to this day. He says, “She walked right up to me, took a drag of a cigarette, blew the smoke in my face and said, 'I thought you were going to call.'” At that moment he knew she was the one, and she knew the same. Six months later they were married. The family quickly grew close, or as Tom says, “Michael adopted me,” and soon there was a father-son bond. Eventually Tom helped manage Michael, which bloomed into an interesting management career. Sandra Bullock, John Leguizamo and Hope Davis are just a few of the talented careers that he helped launch. And as her son’s career started taking off, Mercedes was able to concentrate on her love of music by teaching. Not many vocalists receive training from an award-winning singer. Those who are privileged to be taught by Mercedes are taught only the best techniques. “I tell my students, 'Don’t just listen to the singers, listen to every rhythmic thing going on.'” As she states on her website, “Your diaphragm and all your breathing muscles will work as they should to supply your vocal chords with the right amount of air. No pushing or manipulation is needed in order to achieve a well-connected tone anywhere in your range. Additionally, I believe communication in vocal work is absolutely essential to the function of the instrument as a whole. The vocal and breathing mechanism is set in motion by the desire to express oneself and communicate!” In short time, Mercedes and Tom had a daughter, Mary. It wasn’t surprising to find that she too has followed in the family footsteps and is producing her first album (check out her website, www.marycmusic.com, or www.myspace.com/marycmusic and check out UnExpected). The real treat is to see the performances live. Mercedes blows the crowd away at each show. If you’re really lucky, Mary will join her on stage for an unforgettable duet that only such talented R&B performers can accomplish.
Mercedes' new album, Pure Emotion, is just that. In every word she sings, her emotions and her love for music shine through. The title song was born from a close relationship with the late Chico O’Farrill, a figurehead of the Jazz-Cuban music movement of the '40s and '50s. At the family's request, Mercedes wrote lyrics to Chico’s music, which was envisioned as a bossa nova. Other great hits include "The Masquerade Is Over” and “Black Coffee.” With such cool jazz, it's no wonder that she lifts the house out of its seats. It’s a rarity to find such talent in a world where music and musicians are often made more interesting through the help of computers. Her music sets the mood. Whether it’s jazz, R&B or Brazilian music, there are no restrictions placed on what she can and will accomplish. Her voice carries beautifully, no matter where you’re sitting and is simply hypnotic, as is the music. Pure Emotion is available on iTunes, CD BABY and on Mercedes' official website: www.mercedeshall.com as well as www.myspace.com/mercedeshall Every show, every note and every conversation is as enjoyable, entertaining and memorable as the last. She has raised two wonderful and talented children who have excelled through the love and support that only parents can give. Her husband's support for her is endless; he often manages to have things done before being asked. It is obvious their love for each other is equally as strong today as the day they first met. After all, it’s pure emotion.
