Please forgive this helpless haze I’m in….

There’s always someone else to take up the reigns; and last week, I went to Pizza on the Park not once but twice. I’ve already reported here on seeing Jessie Buckley, just 20 years old, taking and owning the room on Tuesday night; and last night I was back to see another West End alumni of A Little Night Music, the Olivier nominated Kelly Price, use her night off from appearing in The Misanthrope to bring an equally stunning cabaret set to Pizza on the Park, too.

Kelly, of course, went from understudy to Jenna Russell’s Sister Sarah in the Donmar West End revival of Guys and Dolls to take over in the role four years ago, and I interviewed her at the time here. She revealed to me at the time that, on the first day of rehearsals for the show, “I sat there thinking, I know Ewan McGregor is over there, but I can’t look! But he’s a really lovely, ordinary guy, and wouldn’t expect us to treat him like a god.” And she told me, too, that she learnt a lot from watching Russell: “I’d learnt so much the first year from watching Jenna, who was fantastic. We got on very well. She knew what it was like having to rehearse in the daytime and do the show at night, and in fact she was rehearsing a bit for Sunday in the Park with George at the same time, too, that she was going onto! It was strange—while we were both doing that, a lot of people were planning their holidays in places like Mauritius for when they left the show.”“

She obviously learnt her lessons well. But what’s so charming, and disarming, is that she’s still, four years on, completely unaffected and unstarry: the perfect cabaret personality, in fact, since she’s so utterly real. Doing her cabaret on Valentine’s Day, she sang “I’ve Never Been in Love Before” (from Guys and Dolls) that put me in a helpless haze of reflection: I’ve been in love with cabaret, thanks largely to this room, for years, and it’s wonderful to see its legacy continuing here.

It also proves there is still an irresistible hunger and appetite amongst West End performers to prove their own worth in solo programmes. In both Price and Buckley’s cases, it took the nurturing, guiding presence of a fantastic musical director, the brilliant pianist Joe Thompson (whom both had met thanks to their membership of the Ivy Club during their run in A Little Night Music) to make it happen - and if the inevitable result was that some of their repertoires were identical, they rose irresistibly to the challenges posed by his exemplary musicianship to bring some thrilling jazz stylings to a series of mostly familiar standards.

In New York, of course, most performers seem to have a club act up their sleeve; its good insurance for the downtown between shows, and there’s a lucrative concert career to find on the road. But the difference in New York is that there is at least a cabaret club culture in which to both experiment and experience the form, from high-end clubs like Feinsteins, the Algonquin and the Café Carlyle (soon to see the return of one of Britain’s best cabaret performers, Barb Jungr, in a series of late night performances from February 25 to March 6) to excellent, more democratic ones like the wonderful Metropolitan Room in Chelsea.

What’s needed are the impresarios to make cabaret happen and matter over here. Last week’s Pizza on the Park season was produced by Samuel Joseph, a young Australian pianist-and-publicist turned producer, who had adeptly arranged the PR for the Harner/Turnipseed season, and is now branching out into producing on his own account. More often, however, people have to produce themselves: tonight, for one night only, Clare Burt is back at Pizza on the Park, ahead of a season at New York’s Metropolitan Room next month, and she’s doing it all herself.

Still, there’s hope of more on the horizon: the Delfont Room at the Prince of Wales Theatre is becoming a regular cabaret outlet, with Hairspray’s Olivier winning Leanne Jones up next with a set on March 6, and American composer/performer Scott Alan appearing there on March 13. And another new producer, Simon Greiff - who last year set up an independent record label, SimG Records, to release solo albums of West End performers Annalene Beechey and Caroline Sheen (for the latter of which I provided the liner notes) - is bringing Broadway’s Stephanie J Block to the New Players on February 28 for two performances. Then there’s young producers Neil Eckersley and Paul Spicer (who has just taken over in Avenue Q) bringing Broadway star (and Emmy Award winning actress) Megan Mullally to the Vaudeville from tomorrow. The will and desire is obviously there to promote more cabaret in London. Now audiences need to support it.