As if she didn’t have enough to do besides trying to keep Three Muses, her one-of-a-kind Frenchmen Street restaurant and music venue, open through a two-plus year pandemic while also raising two pre-teen daughters, Sophie Lee has managed to put out a delightful new album. Lee told OffBeat’s Brett Milano that the album has been in the can since 2019, but it nevertheless comes across as pandemic-related. 

Fittingly titled The Frenchmen Muse, the record opens with “I Wished on the Moon,” a buoyant tune for these times. Her ace band, featuring Dave Boswell on an inspirational trumpet, introduces the song with some fine guitar comping from Matt Bell before Lee’s languid voice comes in.

The second song, one of two originals on the album (both co-written with producer Earl Scioneaux and Luke Winslow King), is like a musical deep fake. “Remember When” sounds exactly like it was written about the past two years, but to use Milano’s term, it’s simply “prescient.” Some of the lyrics and its bittersweet tone will definitely hit home: “Remember when we lived a life so carelessly, passing all this fleeting time so easily.”

As you would expect from someone who has become a stalwart on the Frenchmen Street scene since opening her club 10 years ago, there are plenty of special guests on the album, including saxophonist Khris Royal and violinist Matt Rhody.

But it’s Lee’s voice and its subtle nuances that make the album special. She digs into some obscure deep cuts, including tunes by Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday, but the album also features such chestnuts as “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” and “I Got a Right to Sing the Blues.” On the former, you can hear her playing off the bass line, creating a sense of improvisation often missing on albums by other vocalists.

A special shout-out has to go to Scioneaux for the chamber string arrangements that bring so much to the originals. Together, they have created a document not so much for the times, but for all time.