Menken & Ashman: Suite from Disney's The Little Mermaid (arr. Menken, Merkin, Pasatieri, Rickets)
Menkan & Schwartz: Colors of the Wind from Disney's Pocohontas (arr. Troob)
Menken & Ashman: Suite from Disney's Beauty and the Beast (arr. Troob & Heijden)
Sherman & Sherman: I Wan'na Be Like You from Disney's The Jungle Book (arr. Heijden)
Sherman & Sherman: Medley from Disney's Mary Poppins (arr. Healey & Whitcomb)
Menken: Suite from Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame (arr. Starobin)
Menken, Ashman & Rice: Suite from Disney's Aladdin (arr. Troob & Healey)
Badelt: Suite from Pirates of the Caribbean (arr. Rickets)
Zimmer, Rice & John: Suite from Disney's The Lion King (arr. Kelley & Rickets)
with one encore (It's A Small World, composer unannounced)
Richard Kaufman, conductor; Sherilyn Draper, stage director and writer; Candice Nicole, Whitney Kaufman, Aaron Phillips, Andrew Johnson, vocalists.
A fitting end for this concert -- and this week in general -- was the encore presentation of It's A Small World. Earlier this week I found that a musician friend of mine has played in a concert with a relative's neighbor in a relatively far off land. In tonight's concert, not only was my violin teacher playing in the orchestra, but Candice Nicole, one of the vocalists was a friend and classmate in high school. Having grown up in Southern California, after all, I don't run into classmates on a regular basis.*
While the Cleveland Orchestra is touring Europe, tonight's concert was in the capable hands of the Blossom Festival Orchestra. The weather, however, wasn't as welcoming with varying degrees of rain up until some point during the middle of the first half of the program; nonetheless, I was surprised by how full the parking lots--and even the lawn--were. A notable attendee was Mrs. "Mr. Rogers" [as in the Neighborhood], a box in front of and to the left of my seat, she had apparently driven in from Pittsburgh to attend this evening's concert.
I had not originally intended to attend this concert, and I quite enjoyed it in all of the important respects. Of course, Disney's movie music is as iconic as the films that they come from. One need only loook around to discover that each selection evoked or provoked different reactions from each audience member: Younger audience members may have perked up to Pocohontas, while the older audience members had a clear affection for Mary Poppins.
During the first few numbers I got the sense that perhaps the vocalists were reaching a bit further than they needed to, but that overly-sharp edge quickly dulled to a nicely burnished sound that persisted through the evening.
While I enjoyed all of the selections to some extent or the other, both the opening overture and the Lion King suite stirred the greatest personal emotion.
While I hate to note, spotlight operators (and/or whomever was calling spot cues) put on a distractingly poor performance, with spots randomly lighting up blank walls, being late to pick up or drop off a performer, and jolting adjustments just as joltingly shifted my brain from 'simply enjoy the music' and to 'what the heck was that?'
Lincoln
*- The timing of these coincidences further amuses me as this is the weekend of the 1 year anniversary of Lincoln in Cleveland (the actual blogday is Monday)
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