It took a few minutes for me to calm down after handing out programs and directing people to the coat rack, the wine. At 7:10 or so, I flashed the lights and asked everyone to go upstairs.

The room was packed. A few stragglers came in late. The audience was ready. Some had no idea what they were about to see. Some had dragged themselves from their Sunday evening comfort to see what was going on at the Old Stone House. People were even willing to miss "The Sopranos."

For me, it was a few minutes into the show, when I actually sat down and focused on the show.

Capathia started out with a couple of beautiful Langston Hughes songs. There was a palpable sense of relief in the room as the audience seemed to melt into her warm musical embrace. It felt easy: they were in good hands. She was about lead the way on an artistic journey and the audience was game.

Then Louis came on stage. He’s been called gaunt, angsty, and Jewish. My sister said he has a remarkable charisma on stage. We were meeting the man behind the music and hearing him sing, too, a masterful story-song about sleezy hotel in Chicago

Then it was time for "Southside Stories" his song cycle based on his book, "The South Side: The Racial Transformation of an American Neighborhood," Rosen’s 1998 exploration of white flight in Chicago’s southside after the neighborhood changed its racial makeup.

The song cycle is very personal but it is also, as Kerry Reid wrote in the Chicago Tribune,  "a somber portrait of heartbreak and survival,joy and its absence,and love that endures even when the objects of that love are long vanished."

The piece has an incredible mood and a very melodic  musical vocabluary that draws on a variety of 1960’s musical style. Different characters, voices and narratives are explored in each song. But they come together to create a wistful, sometimes nostalgic, often painful and ecstatic picture of a time gone by but still held onto fiercely.

In "On the Southside" and "If I Were a Reincarnationist" Rosen shows his skill at creating musical narratives that are like short stories. "Lucky Girl" found Capathia in a joyful, loving mood that was infectious.

From Chicago, we moved to the south of Maya Angelou’s youth. Capathia performed nine songs from the Angelou cycle, that were created expressly for her multi-timbered voice. With her subtle and persuasive sense of drama, Capathia gives life to Angelou’s women and becomes these characters in an instant – her stance, the way she holds her microphone or moves her hand. In tiny theatrical ways, she embodies these phenomenal women and stirs the room with virtuosic blues in a deep alto-to-high soprano range. Her earthy emotionality, full of pain and longing, belies a sophisticated vocal control.

The acoustics at the Old Stone House are astounding. It’s a wonderful place to hear music. And  there is  something about being in that little house in the middle of Brooklyn. The  incongruity of it makes for a magical time.  I have found that when people enter that room they are willing to really focus and listen. And that was truer than true last night. The audience was cradled by Capathia’s voice and big hearted personality.

A standing ovation was the least we could do to convey our apprecation and high regard for the night of fine music and performance we had just been given.