FOUR LOONY DIVAS

Cáitlyn Burke, Alexis Cregger, Sarah Best, and Anne Slovin at The Players

This is the 13th year for Light Opera of New York, co-founded by Carol Davis. We have enjoyed their operettas, four of which have been recorded, as well as their more casual cabaret evenings at The Players on Gramercy Park South. Last night was special! It was special because we heard four lovely ladies of the opera world performing a great variety of songs from the world of opera, light opera, cabaret, American musical theater, and whatever. We love the fact that there were no dividing lines. Any song that is well written and well sung can stand along any other song with the same qualifications.

Director for the evening was the engaging Gary Slavin who introduced the program. Able accompaniment was provided by Music Director Seth Weinstein.

We love Gilbert and Sullivan and were delighted by the opening number "I have a song to sing, O" from Yeoman of the Guard sung by the entire ensemble. The patter song "I am the very model of a modern Major General" from their H.M.S. Pinafore provided no obstacle for these four songbirds!

"Cheerily carols the lark" from Ruddigore was given a lovely interpretation by Sarah Best and Cáitlin Burke. "I cannot tell what this love may be" from Patience was sung by Anne Slovin and Alexis Cregger.

We never tire of Gilbert's clever wordplay or Sullivan's memorable tunes and we enjoyed this Savoy feast.

There were other lighthearted songs on the program. "Vodka" (makes me feel oddka) was given a delightful performance by Ms. Best. This song came from the 1926 musical by George Gershwin and Oscar Hammerstein II  called Song of the Flame. The lyrics are clever and Ms. Best's interpretation was, well, "the best".

We also enjoyed her subtle rendering of "Meadowlark" from Stephen Schwartz' The Baker's Wife as well as  "I hate men" from Cole Porter's Kiss Me Kate. "Always true to you in my fashion" from the same show was given a knowing delivery by Ms. Cregger.

Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I produced so many fine songs and "Something Wonderful" was beautifully performed by Ms. Burke, as was "Climb Every Mountain" from Rodgers and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music.

From a failed show entitled Rags by Charles Strouse we loved the song "Children of the Wind" sung by Ms. Slovin.

Since we did not grow up in the world of American musical theater, most of these songs were new to us and hearing them was a revelation. We are far more familiar with the world of opera and operetta.

From the world of operetta we heard the beautiful "Vilja" from Franz Lehar's Die Lustige Witwe sung by Ms. Cregger and Ms. Slovin's rendering in lovely French "J'en prendrai un deux, trois" from Jacques Offenbach's Pomme d'Api.

From the familiar world of opera, we found Ms. Slovin's performance of Norina's aria "So anch'io al virtù magica" from Donizetti's Don Pasquale to be absolutely enchanting and dramatically valid .

We have saved for last our thrill at hearing the versatile Ms. Cregger perform "Dich, teure Halle" from Wagner's Lohengrin with heroic sound and lots of impetus from Mr. Weinstein's equally heroic piano!

What a splendid night going from one gorgeous song to another with nary a longueur. The time just flew by! Everyone left smiling. Good music will do that for you!

(c) meche kroop

MASTER AT THE PIANO

Matthew Pearce, Tamara Banješević, Katerina Burton, Shereen Pimentel, Courtenay Cleary,
and Cameron Richardson-Eames

Last night we attended Cameron Richardson-Eames' Master of Music recital at Juilliard and we were rewarded with a night of magnificent music making. We know Mr. Richardson-Eames mainly through his performances with students from the Vocal Arts Program and had never really considered that collaborative pianists play with other instrumentalists. We are happy to report that this one "plays well with others".

We thrilled to his performance of César Franck's Sonata for Violin and Piano in A Major; the violinist was the superlative Courtenay Cleary and did they ever make music together! The first movement, Allegretto ben moderato opened with some descending arpeggi of minor triads which soon yielded to a theme of descending scales. These two themes would reappear periodically knitting the work together with a feeling of unity and familiarity. The overall emotion was one of nostalgia.

The Allegro which followed opened with some rumbling in the piano, leading to a veritable storm of anxiety. There was an "eye" to this hurricane but the storm recurred with increased passion.

The third movement (Ben moderato) seemed reflective to us and we liked the liquid manner in which the arpeggi reappeared in the piano, whilst the violin was given some lovely trills.

The fourth movement reminded us of a vocal duet in which the piano and violin each had a different melody with both contributing to a whole that was greater than the sum of the parts. In no way do we consider ourself to be knowledgeable about piano technique but we know artistry when we hear it because we get "the feels".

The second half of the program was on more familiar territory for us since Mr. Richardson-Eames collaborated with four different singers, singing four different styles of song, readily demonstrating his adaptability.

Soprano Katerina Burton, just reviewed a few days ago for some lovely performances of Joseph Marx lieder, has a real feel for this composer and sang "Hat dich die Liebe berührt" and "Nocturne" in which the interludes of rippling in the piano tickled the ear. Ms. Burton's voice opened like an umbrella at the top giving us tons of overtones. We cannot wait to see how Juilliard will polish this particular gem.

Already polished and enjoying a fine career overseas, Tamara Banješević was on hand to perform a pair of songs by Henri Duparc. Chansons can get a bit effete but not these! We have missed hearing Ms. Banješević and found her presence last night to be a very pleasant surprise. "Chanson triste" sounded splendid with the two artists in lovely harmony, both of them expressive and making good use of dynamic variety. "L'invitation au voyage" was performed with almost indecent sensuality and we loved it!

Tenor Matthew Pearce performed two songs in English from the early 20th c. We didn't get much out of Herbert Howells' "The Goat Paths" with its simple vocal line which didn't stay with us, and its spare accompaniment. We preferred the rather silly "I have twelve oxen" by John Ireland, a strophic song that sounded like a folk song. The rhythm was fun and Mr. Pearce has a lovely high register achieved without pushing, and an admirable clarity of diction.

The program ended with soprano Shereen Pimentel singing two songs from Stephen Schwartz' 2003 Wicked--"The Wizard and I" and "I'm Not That Girl". We would far prefer to hear these songs than what passes for contemporary "art song". Ms. Pimentel has incredible stage presence and a lively personality best suited to songs that require dramatic intent. We once sat through Wicked on Broadway, with teeth clenched against the cruel amplification, unable to understand the words. Last night we heard the songs unamplified and could appreciate the artistry of the composition as well as the artistry of Ms. Pimentel's performance.

It was a perfect way to end the recital and we left completely satisfied. Mr. Richardson-Eames demonstrated his artistry and flexibility and is a credit to his teacher, the highly esteemed Brian Zeger.

(c) meche kroop

TWO IMPRESSIVE DEBUTS at WEILL RECITAL HALL

Melody Moore (photo by Chip Gillespie)

Benjamin Perry Wenzelberg

It isn't every day that we get to celebrate two debuts--that of the aptly named famous soprano Melody Moore, heretofore unknown to us, and that of musical wunderkind Benjamin Perry Wenzelberg, about whom we have been writing  for several years.  Mr. Wenzelberg sings, conducts, plays several instruments and composes. He is finishing his first opera.  But last night's impressive debut was a song he was commissioned to write for Ms. Moore.

It isn't every day that we hear the "f word" in Carnegie Hall and that is another first that we will get to further along in our review

Ms. Moore has been making quite a name for herself with her highly dramatic interpretations and warm stage presence.  The list of roles she has tackled and those upcoming give one the impression of astonishing versatility--Mozart, Wagner, Puccini, Verdi, Bizet, and Jerome Kern are all represented. With collaborative pianist Robert Mollicone, she held the Weill Recital Hall audience in rapt attention. 

Stefano Donaudy and Ottorino Respighi were contemporaries but their turn of the 20th c. songs could not be more different.  Donaudy looked backward to the 19th c. that we so love and Ms. Moore sang his "Amorosi miei giorni" with an attractive vibrato and well-shaped phrasing. The embellishments were superbly handled and we are hoping that Ms. Moore may get interested in the bel canto repertory.

Respighi's work looked more toward the future with less glorious melodic invention but more interesting harmonic structure.  Ms. Moore sang his "Notte" with gorgeous coloring. 

But nothing captivated us as much as  Puccini's early song "Sole e amore" to which, we believe, he wrote the text himself. We felt our eyes tearing up and realized that the melody and accompaniment were almost identical with those heard in his opera La Bohème!

Claude Debussy, a contemporary of Puccini, distinguished himself from his colleagues by setting prose and free verse that he wrote himself.  Thus what we are hearing seems to be an aural counterpart to paintings of the Impressionist school, although Debussy vociferously objected to his music being called impressionistic.  One's ears are surrounded by beauty that is mutable and unstable.

We were delighted to be introduced to his Proses lyriques, in which Ms. Moore and Mr. Mollicone painted pictures in sound.  In "De grève", the piano provided multiple images of the sea, both at rest and in its wildest moments. The final song "De soir" gave the singer an opportunity to paint auditory portraits of Debussy's varied images by means of gesture and vocal coloring.

The second half of the program began with Strauss songs, in which Ms. Moore's operatic voice seemed more at home. In the first half, the bronchitis which she had pushed aside (a less confident artist might have begged the audience's indulgence) lent a somewhat hard edge to her voice when she pushed for volume in the upper range. But in the Strauss, everything sounded just fine. 

We always love the bittersweet "Befreit" from his Op.39 in which the words speak of joy but the occasion is one of releasing a loved one to death. We heard a beautifully modulated performance in which Ms. Moore spun out the final note to great emotional effect.

The final work on the program sprang from an original idea. Ms. Moore asked five composers to set texts by a poet of whom she is very fond, Clementine von Radics. This young poet has been well-celebrated; we can understand why her texts about the female experience of love have resonated with her readers.

But when we read the texts they seemed to us like novelistic prose, requiring no music to make their impact. Obviously, the five composers felt otherwise and managed to make music for Ms. Moore and Mr. Mollicone to perform.

Having just reviewed an evening of Stephen Schwartz' music at Manhattan School of Music, we were most eager to hear what this versatile composer, equally at home with Broadway musicals and opera, would add to the text. We found he was the most successful of the group at emphasizing the vocal line, making it interesting and singable. His lyricism is wondrously accessible and he knows how to write for the voice so that every single word can be understood. We liked the way he used repetition, especially of the word "river" in "Someday I Will Stop Being Young and Wanting Stupid Tattoos".

It is interesting that Mr. Wenzelberg became friendly with Ms. Moore on the set of Mr. Schwartz' 2011 opera Séance on a Wet Afternoon, one of a very few contemporary operas that we would want to see a second time. We care not a whit if other reviewers find his work "too accessible"!

As far as the texts set by other composers, we admired the pianistic writing more than the vocal line. Since certain verses and lines were omitted from the program notes, there were many phrases that went by without comprehension, although it was no challenge to get the gist of what Ms. Moore was singing about.

Each composer was able to choose the text he wanted to set and Mr. Wenzelberg had felt a special affinity for "Some Things You Could Do to Heal Yourself".  We loved the dramatic intensity and the melismatic vocal line on the word "silly".

Scott Gendel's setting had some lovely writing for piano and Gregg Kallor wrote a suitably quiet setting for the text of "A Prayer".  David Hanlon wrote the cabaret-inflected music for "Poems and Other Sentimental Bullshit". 

It was in this song that the f-bomb was dropped. At the risk of sounding prudish, we do not find the "f word" suitable in an art song.  Clearly we were outvoted since the audience seemed to love this instance of  épater le bourgeois.  We would prefer "sentimental bullshit"!

As encore, Ms. Moore sang Mr. Rogers' song "It's You I Like", an original way to end the evening.

(c) meche kroop

MSM DOES STEPHEN SCHWARTZ

Defying Gravity--the Magical World of Stephen Schwartz (photo by Anna Yatskevich)

Year after year, the students of the American Musical Theater Ensemble of the Manhattan School of Music present an evening of entertainment that rivals any evening you might spend on Broadway.

Last night's DEFYING GRAVITY presented the songs of Stephen Schwartz in a clever revue format, conceived and directed by Carolyn Marlow. The concept involved extracting songs from his large oeuvre and weaving them together with dialogue that posited interesting relationships among the members of the cast, comprising a dozen talented young performers, as adept at dancing and acting as they are at singing.

There was an arrogant male figure (Joseph Sacchi) and an insecure one (Luke Sikora), and a bunch of gals just bursting with pizazz. There was a big guy with an operatic voice (Christopher Lilley) and a skinny one (Frank Humphrey) who needed a lesson in "Style" from The Magic Show. 

Composer Stephen Schwartz has written a slew of captivating  award-winning musicals for the stage and for film--even having scored some Disney films. His tunes are memorable and the lyrics capture the zeitgeist beautifully. Having gotten on board too late for anything but Wicked, we will have to do a library search to get exposed to more of his writing, since the taste we had last night served to whet our appetite.

The voices were all excellent and the performers adept at creating believable characters. We particularly enjoyed Allie Altieri in the wistful "Lion Tamer" from The Magic Show and her moving account of "Just Beyond the Riverbend" from the film Pocahontas. Mr. Humphrey did his best work in "Corner of the Sky" from Pippin. The two artists sang these two songs simultaneously. (We don't know how they worked this out so successfully).

In "Style" the pair, pretending to be awkward losers, were coached by the very stylish Gabriela Moscoso and Christopher Lilley, both of whom had the moves. It's always humorous to see talented people pretending to be clumsy.

Ms. Moscoso was featured in a lot of numbers and impressed us with her high octane personality and expressive acting. She led Anna Mayo and Juliana Levinson in the wonderful "Sweet, Sweet, Sweet" from The Magic Show, and had a great solo in "Spread a Little Sunshine" from Pippin. 

Mr. Lilley commanded the stage in "Simple Song" from Leonard Bernstein's Mass (for which Schwartz wrote the lyrics) accompanied by Mr. Humphrey and some lovely flute playing from Aaron Patterson, who was just as fine on the clarinet as he accompanied the lovely Grace Callahan in "Blame it on the Summer Night" from Rags, for which Charles Strouse wrote the music. There was a fine bright ring in her upper register. We also enjoyed the duet "All for the Best" from Godspell, in which she was joined by Anna Mayo.

Ms. Mayo was lovely in "Since I Gave My Heart Away" from Gepetto while Nicole DeLuca and Joseph Sacchi did a graceful ballroom dance. There was a theme running through the revue that Ms. DeLuca, whose character was headed for a stint on Broadway, got nothing but negativity from her boyfriend, portrayed by Joseph Sacchi, as an arrogant philanderer, trying to keep his woman down on the farm, in pre-liberation mode.

Mr. Sacchi's solo "Proud Lady" from The Baker's Wife was excellently done. He got his comeuppance from the ladies of the cast in "Turn Back, O Man" from Godspell; they sure strutted their stuff and waved their feather boas!

There were some beautiful harmonies in "Serenade" from The Baker's Wife and even more harmony in five parts in "In Pursuit of Excellence" from Children of Eden.  

Juliana Levinson expressed some lovely sentiments in French in "Chanson" from The Baker's Wife.

Luke Sikora portrayed an insecure fella who finds his bearings during the show. There was nothing insecure about his performance however. His "everyman" in "Extraordinary" from Pippin was great and his "Dancing Through Life" from Wicked was even better.

The excellent musicians were not in the pit but were upstage. Music director and pianist Shane Schag was joined by guitarist Sean Richey, bassist Connor Schultze, percussionist Guilhem Flouzat and the aforementioned Aaron Patterson, a virtuoso on flute, clarinet and saxophone. Orchestrations were by Mike Webster with some special arrangements by Warren Helms.

The set and lighting by Shawn Kaufman were simple, involving staircases on either side with a walkway extending the width of the stage up above. The risers of the stairs were illuminated with tiny colored lights and the backdrop was washed in intense colors. It was simple but effective.

Colleen Durham's choreography was well suited to the skills of the students.  We particularly enjoyed a dance with black bowler hats that made us think of Bob Fosse.

Whether these students elect a career on the opera stage or on the Broadway stage, they do seem destined for success.

(c) meche kroop