Los Angeles-based vocalist and renowned vocal coach Deborah Shulman transforms personal hardship into musical grace with her latest album, We Had a Moment, released October 24, 2025 on Summit Records. The deeply intimate collection—her sixth album and fifth for the label—was conceived during one of the most difficult periods of her life, when she was undergoing radiation therapy for breast cancer. Between treatments, Shulman began revisiting the songs that had marked her journey — pieces that spoke to love, loss, resilience, and the will to keep creating.
Now cancer-free, Shulman delivers her most personal and emotionally resonant work to date — a record that feels less like a performance and more like a life story told in song. “Music carried me through,” she says. “These are songs I’ve always wanted to sing, but this time, I finally understood what they truly meant.”
We Had a Moment features ten songs recorded across two eras of her life — seven recent sessions with her longtime collaborator and pianist Jeff Colella, and three unreleased gems from earlier recordings with Terry Trotter, the acclaimed pianist whose credits include work with Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Natalie Cole, Celine Dion, and Larry Carlton. The result is an album that spans time, experience, and emotion, weaving together reflections of past and present.
Throughout her career, Shulman has been celebrated as an interpreter who breathes new life into beloved standards. Critics have lauded her ability to make the familiar feel freshly revealed — DownBeat Magazine awarded her previous work four stars, while The Entertainment Report praised her “innate talent to make the listener re-think a song,” and Michael Doherty noted “honesty and intimacy in her approach.”
On We Had a Moment, Shulman dives deeper than ever into the emotional core of each lyric. She opens with Stephen Sondheim’s “Anyone Can Whistle,” a song she connects to her early struggles in show business and the challenge of finding her voice in an industry that often wanted her to fit a mold. She swings warmly on “No Moon at All,” recorded with Trotter, bassist Kenny Wild, and drummer Joe La Barbera, a nod to her late husband Rick, who was her steadfast musical and emotional partner.
During her cancer treatments, she found strength in “Without a Song,” her father’s favorite tune, while the moving mashup of “New York State of Mind / On Broadway” reflects her lifelong connection to musical theater and the dream of performing on stage. The album’s title comes from Sondheim’s “With So Little to Be Sure Of,” a piece that took on new poignancy following the unexpected passing of her husband soon after recording wrapped.
Other highlights include “Goodbye Love / Not Like This,” a haunting Colella arrangement that fuses jazz and classical textures, “The Laughter and the Tears” by Randy Edelman, and “Miss Otis Regrets,” Cole Porter’s darkly elegant tale of passion and consequence. Shulman closes the record with “You Must Believe in Spring,” performed with Trotter and guitarist Larry Koonse — a tender affirmation of hope and renewal that feels like a benediction.
Anchored by an all-star rhythm section — Colella, Trotter, Wild, Chris Colangelo, La Barbera, Kendall Kay, and Koonse — the album captures Shulman’s voice at its most expressive and unguarded. Her delivery carries the weight of experience and the grace of survival, offering listeners an emotional journey through love, grief, and healing.
We Had a Moment is more than a jazz vocal album — it’s a chronicle of endurance, gratitude, and rediscovery. Each song feels like a letter from someone who has seen the fragility of life up close yet still sings with unwavering faith in beauty and connection.
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