WAILING AT WATERTOWER: When the title of the show is Black Pearl Sings!, and Liz Mikel is playing Pearl, you know at least part of the show will be very right, right? WaterTower Theatre’s show casts Mikel as a Depression-era Texas prisoner who comes in contact with a musicologist (Diana Sheehan) wanting to record her songs. “Mikel exudes tragic grandeur,” Lawson Taitte writes in his review. “Her voice, which can soar or rasp or dive deep and dirty, is finally what Black Pearl Sings! is all about.” But this is a two-woman show, and David Novinski says Sheehan holds up her end of the bargain. “She adds color and feeling to her rendition of an Irish lament and suddenly an audience who may have come for Black Pearl are enjoying an unexpected bonus,” he writes in his Front Row review. Meanwhile, Alexandra Bonifield calls the Frank Higgins’ play, “an illuminating tapestry of song, sorrow and strife.”

MUSIC BITS: If LeBron James is deciding on where to play next year based on who woos him with the best song, Dallas has got to be in way better shape than Cleveland. … KXT 91.7 has posted new in-studio videos of Smokin’ Joe Kubek & Bnois King and Mason Jennings.

BOOK BITS: Larry McMurtry has jumped on the E-book bandwagon, making the improbable jump from typewriter straight to Kindle. (nytimes.com) … North Texas author Danny Tobey puts his Ivy League experience to good use in his debut novel, The Faculty Club. (startelegram.com)