"My Tears Dry On Their Own."

Good news from the U.K.'s Daily Mail:

     A glowing Amy Winehouse bounced back from her recent health problems to sing at Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday concert in Hyde Park last night.

     The 24-year-old singer belted out renditions of her hit songs Valerie and Rehab in front of the 46,664-strong crowd, before returning to the stage at the climax of the gig for a rendition of The Special AKA's hit Free Nelson Mandela with Jerry Dammers and the Soweto Gospel Choir.

     Teaming her signature beehive and heavy black eyeliner with a cream and black mini-dress, Winehouse looking remarkably tanned and healthy compared to her pale demeanour a few days ago.

     Winehouse left a private London hospital on Monday after being diagnosed with early signs of emphysema following a fainting incident last week.

     I love great singers--whether a famous or obscure singer/songwriter, a silky-throated pop music interpreter, a sandpaper and crushed-stone midnight growler, a pipe-smoking prairie folkie, a vino-besotted opera diva, a curtain-closing crooner, a shy, pretty girl on a back-patio with her too-big guitar, or a cat-eyed, clear-as-Russian-vodka soprano choir director--with their in-the-moment voices, breathing life (and death) into their song.

     Amy Winehouse might not be all that, but the chick's got soul.

     I think that all great singers are essentially Method voice actors, and because they inhabit the songs, their listeners do, too. 

     Maybe Amy Winehouse hides all that soul in her beehive; maybe that's where the "it" she's got is. 

     She may be tabloid, but Amy ain't hype.

     I wanna hear her dynamic, behind-the-beat phrasing and Marlboro 'n whisky voice for a long, long time...    

     Stick around, sister, stick around...