Unable to interest a major label in recording her music, Cassidy cashed in a small pension she had accumulated while working at her day job in a nursery to self-fund this recording of herself and her live band, comprising Lenny Williams, Keith Grimes, Chris Biondo and Raice McLeod, with Cassidy herself supplying vocals and acoustic guitar. The Blues Alley venue was booked for two nights, January 2 and 3, 1996, however on the first night technical issues prevented the tapes being any use so all of the recorded material used originates from the second, Wednesday night's performance. Cassidy was suffering from a light cold through both shows and initially felt that the performances were not good enough to release, but eventually agreed after a previously completed studio take of "Oh, Had I a Golden Thread" was added to round out the package. Unfortunately, this was to be Cassidy's last release in her lifetime, although in retrospect the beginning of her posthumous rise to fame; less than ten months later she was dead, victim of a melanoma which in all probability she acquired during prolonged sun exposure as part of her daytime occupation. Video recordings of a number of the same performances, virtually the sum of her recorded video legacy, were later released on DVD as Eva Cassidy Sings, and again on the DVD portion of the 2-CD + 1-DVD 2015 compilation Nightbird, of which the audio CDs include remixed versions of the songs from Live at Blues Alley as well as 19 additional tracks from the same concert, a subset of which had previously also been included on other posthumous Cassidy releases.
Music
Live at Blues Alley serves as an example of Cassidy's eclectic tastes, covering classic and contemporary artists from Billie Holiday to Sting, including Al Green, Pete Seeger, Irving Berlin and more. Her cover of "Fields of Gold" was a popular radio song and record companies used it to promote her material; in 2001 Michelle Kwan skated to the music of Eva's version of this song. "What a Wonderful World", the last song she ever performed live, retains one of the rare introductions on the album that was not edited out in which she dedicates the song to her parents. "Golden Thread", by Pete Seeger, was declared by Eva as her favorite song in the album's liner notes and the song she felt had turned out the best on the album. It actually was not performed live at Blues Alley but was pre-recorded months earlier.
Reception
The album inspired attention from audiences outside of her local following in Washington D.C. Before and during the album's recording, Cassidy suffered many physical health problems, whose causes, at the time, were unknown. A month after the album was released, she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Unfortunately, she died three months later without experiencing the peak of her musical career, which would come after her death. "Her posthumous success," writes William Cooper, "has been astonishing, with worldwide critical acclaim and extensive exposure on British television that helped her album Songbird climb to number one on the British album chart in March, 2001."
