I can’t curate a week of Song of the Day posts without featuring my favorite composer, Stephen Sondheim, the musical theatre’s most prolific living writer. I suspect most of you know Sondheim and George Furth’s 1970 musical Company, but in case this song slipped off the playlist the last time you were at a Midtown sing-along piano bar I’ll provide a little context.
Read MoreI love when great artists cover other great artists’ songs, especially when the cover version turns a pop tune into a beltress’s torch ballad. Today I present you Sara Bareilles’ piano/vocal rendition of Elton John’s 1973 hit “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.”
Read MoreStanisław Moniuszko’s Halka is regarded as the Polish national opera and is widely performed in the composer’s homeland. However, the opera is seldom heard outside Poland despite its charming folk dances, haunting melodies, and a star turn for a lyric soprano.
Read MoreWe begin our week with a horror story in the Black Forest. One of my favorite things about the study of poetry and music is opening my imagination to the world in which these magnificent compositions were birthed. Take a journey with me now to Stuttgart in the 1820s where we meet a twenty-something year old named Eduard Mörike who was studying to be a clergyman but along the way found a passion for writing.
Read MoreFor the finale, back to harmony and counterpoint. This is the final trio from Der Rosenkavalier, by my all-time favorite cast of Renee Fleming, Susan Graham, and Christine Schaefer. In 2000 a friend and I saw the Fleming-Graham-Schaefer trio in Rosenkavalier at the Met Opera and it was glorious.
Read MoreBorn to Run can be considered Bruce Springsteen’s anthem. It is also the song that may have saved his career. Up until that moment, Springsteen’s two albums were not selling well. He had a fan base in New Jersey, Manhattan clubs and, for some reason, Arizona. There were executives at Columbia Records who wanted to turn him loose, but his supporters, who were the company publicists and promoters, plus John Hammond, who signed him, convinced everyone to keep him on the label. Third time was the charm.
Read MoreHere’s to the Eagles, despised by many critics who didn’t think their music was tough enough for rock and roll, but loved by their many fans who made their Greatest Hits the best selling album of all time (29 million copies thus far). I loved them best in concert and “Seven Bridges Road” was a particular knockout—the band standing together, doing what sounded to me like flawless 5 part harmony.
Read More“Sing for Your Supper”, a Rodgers and Hart trio from The Boys from Syracuse is irresistibly goofy, especially when it’s done so enthusiastically by world class singers. I couldn’t decide who did it better—the Broadway stars Rebecca Luker, Audra McDonald and Mary Testa or the opera legends Frederica von Stade, Marilyn Horne and Renee Fleming.
Read MoreLet’s start with Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer. To know their music is to love it. They wrote a string of classic songs without ever managing to write a hit Broadway show. “Come Rain or Come Shine” was written for St. Louis Woman that lasted 103 performances in spite of its gorgeous score. Eileen Farrell, accompanied by Leonard Bernstein, performs it here.
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