Author: Michael Witthaus

Palace brings Carole King story to stage

For anyone who ever wondered where songs come from, the Palace Theatre’s splendid production of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical provides a perfect primer. It’s to director Carl Rajotte’s credit that the music, performed by a talented ensemble cast, is accompanied by photos of original artists like the Drifters, Shirelles and Righteous Brothers, as well as the principal artists played by feature actors.

Rachel Gubow shines in the title role, her first at the Palace, both as a singer and actress. She reveals how King, along with songwriting partner Gerry Goffin, helped shape the soundtrack of a generation. Austin Mirsoltani, also making his Palace debut, does an admirable job as Goffin, as he illustrates the inspiration for songs like “Up on the Roof” and “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?” along with the challenges of working in a highly competitive creative environment.

That milieu is fleshed out by Donnie Kirschner, who ran Aldon Music in 1960s Times Square, played by Ken Quiricone, along with fellow songwriters Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil. In the latter roles, Evan Ross Brody and Lauren Echausse are hilarious, earning more than a few laugh-out-loud moments on opening night.

Brody is reprising a role he recently played in a Florida production of Beautiful. In an interview following the initial performance, Director Rajotte called the pair’s contribution essential. “Evan sent us his reel, and I just thought he was hysterical,” he said. “This show needs that, Cynthia and Barry, to lighten it up.”

He continued that Gubow seemed destined to portray the artist who, as a composer, helped shape the mid-20th-century’s Great American Songbook and later joined contemporaries like James Taylor and Joni Mitchell for a singer-songwriter movement that included her 1971 solo album Tapestry.

When the show opened on Broadway, Gubow was just out of school and auditioned for the lead role, urged by her agent. “That was her first Broadway callback, and even though she knew at the time it was a dream, ever since then she’s been studying Carole King,” Rajotte said. Later, Gubow was an understudy in a Beverly, Mass., production, serving one time as lead. “She came in knowing the show really well, which is great, because Carole’s on stage all the time.”

There’s much more to King’s story than music. Beautiful spans a turbulent decade, and Mirsoltani is convincing as a man who feels constrained by suburbia, even as he’s writing the words to songs like “Pleasant Valley Sunday” for the Monkees sitcom. Goffin and King’s marital breakdown brought a visceral response from the opening night crowd; their acting is that convincing.

As written by Douglas McGrath, the musical’s book is a historical mashup. For example, Act 1 ends in a Vermont ski lodge in 1964, and the second begins with King working on an arrangement of “Chains” — which was actually a hit for the Cookies two years earlier. Also, and perhaps less critical, King’s transition from Goffin’s partner to solo performer omits a messy path that included both a failed trio called The City, and a pre-Tapestry solo record.

Such artistic license is allowable in the service of vividly depicting a moment that likely won’t come again, as a gaggle of creatives barely out of their teens followed their instincts into immortality. Nuanced performances from the core five cast members show the movement from musicians performing other people’s songs to writing their own, the cultural upheaval of the hippie movement, and creating in a place where, to use a Cynthia Weil line, there was “always magic in the air.”

There are many reasons to see this more than excellent production before it closes on May 12. All of them are good ones, but director Rajotte’s rationale is perhaps the best.

“I know everyone is coming to hear Carole King’s music,” he said, “but what I really want is that they hear her life story … where the music came from is just so important.”

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical
When: Fridays, 7:30 p.m., Saturdays, 2 & 7:30 p.m., Sundays, 2 p.m. through May 12
Where: Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St., Manchester
Tickets: $28 and up at palacetheatre.org

Featured Photo: Austin Mirsoltani and Rachel Gubow in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical.

Gregorian puts new spin on medieval music

Few experiences are more soothing than listening to Gregorian chant, a form of liturgical plainchant dating back to the ninth century. It originated in European churches and is most often performed a capella, though sometimes there’s spare instrumental accompaniment. It’s spiritual music, with songs like “Jesus, Joy of Man’s Desire” in most programs.

Taking this idiom into the modern world is Gregorian: Pure Chants in Concert, which stops in Concord on April 20, part of the German company’s first American tour. First of all, there are way more lasers and dry ice smoke than any medieval monk dreamed up, and though sacred songs dominate the show’s first half, the second is filled with today’s hits.

Songs like Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose” and Simon & Garfunkel’s “The Sound of Silence” are perfectly suited for the ethereal chorale. Gregorian, founded by Frank Peterson 25 years ago, has adapted hundreds of contemporary songs, even covering R.E.M.’s “Losing My Religion.” The first was Eric Clapton’s “Tears In Heaven.”

In a recent phone interview, Peterson was asked to name his favorite.

“That’s a hard question,” he said. “One is ‘Chasing Cars’ and another is ‘Bravado’ by Rush, I think that came out great … but it’s hard to say. There are a couple of Pink Floyd tracks we covered that were perfect; it’s almost like they were written for Gregorian chants.”

An easier question is whether there are any that couldn’t be transformed.

“One of the first songs that we tried was ‘Human Behavior’ by Bjork and that’s just undoable,” he said, “Until this day, we haven’t managed to get our heads around it…. To give it a twist is not always that easy.”

The idea of updating Gregorian chants for modern audiences came to Peterson in the late 1980s, when he visited a famous monastery outside Madrid. At the same time the monastery’s monks were singing Gregorian chants, he heard a drumbeat in the distance. The synchronicity gave him pause.

“I thought, ‘This is an amazing combination,’” he said. In a nearby record shop, he found a few albums. “They were dusty because nobody buys Gregorian chant records, really. I took them home, sampled them, and put them together with loops. That resulted in this project called Enigma.”

Amazingly, the world was waiting for souped-up ancient music, and Enigma ended up spending six years on the Billboard charts.

“That was the first time that we combined drum loops, modern music with a chant, and we did original songs,” he said. “Ten years later I started Gregorian, which was the other way around.”

Along the way, they’ve made an album a year; the latest is Pure Chants II.

“It’s a classical crossover record,” Peterson said of the new disc. “We do a very stripped-down version of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah,’ for example, and a really thrilling version of ‘O Fortuna,’ which is obviously classical, but … it’s quite massive and sinister as well.”

Gregorian plays arenas in Europe, but growth was gradual. First, they performed in churches, later moving to theaters. Peterson was ambitious from the outset.

“I wanted to do a show that I would like to see,” he said, “I don’t want to see eight guys standing there singing songs, [so] we did special effects, great lighting and so on. Obviously, people liked it.”

The current tour kicked off to a full house in South Carolina. Accompanying the eight-voice choir is Anita Brightman, sister of famous singer Sarah Brightman, and two supporting musicians. Peterson is happy to finally play America.

“Some of the singers have never been to the States at all, not even as tourists,” he said. “So they’re really excited about exploring your country on the tour bus and doing concerts every night. It’s wonderful for us.”

Peterson thinks Gregorian’s success reflects the times. “It has a very calming effect, and people use it for meditation,” he said, “I just like to take this vibe of the calmness and the soothing aspect of this choir sound and turn it into something that’s familiar. I think that really is ringing a nerve with a lot of people.”

Gregorian: Pure Chants in Concert
When: Saturday, April 20, 7 p.m.
Location: Capitol Center for the Arts, 44 S. Main St., Concord
Tickets: $46.75 and up at ccanh.com

Featured Photo: Gregorian. Courtesy photo.