When a concept works for a production that instantly captures the performer’s persona and style, you’ve accomplished the foundation for a tight show. When it perfectly fits 27 artists’ musical styles you’ve hit a gold mine. Such is the case with this year’s cabaret benefit KSJA All Hits Radio Cabaret 200.7. Friday night’s three hour performance, not including a one hour length intermission/raffle, offered 30 numbers from 27 performers. They were asked the question: What’s a favorite radio memory and what music does it bring to mind? Their responses stirred up the recreation of 1960s & 1970s AM radio done as a concert format and the results were pure blissful satisfaction.
That Blue and Gold Look
That Backup Band
That Musical Lineup
Both funny and clever radio jingles were masterfully recorded by many of the cast in Dick Hedlund’s recording studio for tonight’s concert and were interspersed between numbers. “SJA, You’ve Got a Groovy Kind of Church” comes to mind. Guitar playing duo Boyd Lee and Joe Cruz, first up after the opening, chose America’s “Ventura Highway” to play, offering plenty of melodious harmony and a good guitar solo from Cruz.
Cabaret Co-Producer and vocalist-musician Anna Vagle welcomed everyone to “KSJA Land” then Gwen Matthews, a favorite guest performer at St. Joan’s entered the stage. In a somber mood, she reflected upon the Katrina disaster and the tragic ghetto-like aftermath that bestows some its population while Schnitzer accompanied in an inspired guitar intro for the Elvis Presley staple “In the Ghetto.” A stellar chorus backup aided Matthews that included Deb Harley, Carin Vagle, Rachel Kroog, Nancy Stockhaus, Anna Vagle, Steve Kramer, Cyril Paul, Fred Vagle and Joe Chouinard. Subdued for her, Matthews approached this material with restrained tenderness and finished in a jazzy scat-like flourish.
Opera singer Maria Jette, lent a rich coloratura soprano vocal to the 1972 disaster flick theme song from The Poseidon Adventure “The Morning After.” A rather uninspired pop vocal from the original vocalist—Maureen McGovern, Jette elevated this thin material to something of substance. Fred Vagle on guitar joined his wife Anna to rekindle their favorite love song from the 1967 radio hit The Turtle’s “Happy Together.”
Remember that old WCCO radio program “Point of Law”? This five minute daily mini-radio drama brought a certain legal question to the table followed by resolution from a judge’s verdict. Well, this gets ripe for parody with St. Joan’s treatment “Point of Canon Law” where served is the case of the former Pastor’s stash (Chianti stashed in a secret mini-bar hidden behind a portrait in the church). Well, who is the rightful owner of this wine becomes the question at hand. A lawyer (Tim Roehl) and a Church administrator (SJA’s own Pete Eichten) hash over details that culminate with a Judge’s (our own Fr. Jim DeBruycker) final verdict: The wine glasses should go to recycling while the wine should be turned over to the protective custody of the judge himself. Funny stuff indeed, if presented in front of an audience and it helps if the judge ably pokes fun at himself. Good work, Pastor DeBruycker.
Introduced as church tourists, Paul and Tim Frantzich turned The Everly Brothers’ “Can’t Help Falling In Love” into an audience sing-along while Michael Monroe delivered a standard take of James Taylor’s “You’ve Got a Friend”; more distinctive was Chouinard’s accordion accompaniment. Dan’s father returned with the John Chouinard Quartet tackling Meredith Wilson’s classic barbershop crooner “Lida Rose,” from The Music Man which also included a peek-a-boo appearance from Jette at mid-song layering the quartet with her lovely delivery of “Dream On.”
Representing the senior element of the show, Jim ten Bensel harkened back to the days “when suspense and the whistler sent shivers up our spine” with a trombone solo and some sweet vocalizing with “Radio,” a 1940s homage to the days when radio brought the world to your home. Sans her usual guitar in hand, Ann Reed stepped forward, sat down and in stark vocal nailed the quiet nuances of Janis Ian’s 1975 song about an ugly duckling’s painful loneliness “At Seventeen.” Heartbreaking and introverted, these lyrics are still as gut wrenching to take in as they were 32 years ago. If it wasn’t for Ian’s smooth cocktail lounge like musical arrangement underpinning this song, one could just reduce to a pool of tears upon listening. Joe Chouinard’s trumpet and ten Bensel’s trombone playing warmed like a comforting blanket that stifles the cold chill of the song’s cruel reality. A well received audience response greeted Reed and the musicians. Perking things up a bit, Dan Chouinard in a DJ-like voice mischievously commented about the previous song, “With a little bit of a downer.”
Debbie Duncan and the band jazzed up the tempo with a cover of the great Grady Tate Jazz tune “Sack Full of Dreams.” Wistful and quite playful, Duncan caressed each note with knowing assurance while Chouinard kicked out good piano accompaniment, and a real treat to hear was Greg Keel’s saxophone solo. Gospel sensation Robert Robinson delivered all the goods with “If You Don’t Know Me By Now,” an exquisite choice for him. Dry and comical singing the verses, Robinson burst into a driving gospel wail on each chorus cutting deeper each time with powerful grit. The full band, including a driving sax solo from Keel and a power house chorus accompaniment from Anna Vagle, Deb Harley, Carin Vagle, Nancy Stockhaus and Steve Kremer brought the house down with a standing ovation.
From past SJA Cabarets, Mary Jane Alm often would do ballads, but I like to see her rock and doing Linda Ronstadt’s big 1974 hit “You’re No Good,” she was able to show off some of her sass and spunk. Nancy Stockhaus, Deb Harley and Debbie Duncan raised the temperature a few notches with some heated backup vocals while the band really ignited fire. Cruz and Schnitzer traded some intense guitar interplay and Vague intercut a few impressive licks on a solo. Cruz took it home with an extended guitar tag that went all out to a ferocious finish. Fire continued to ignite when Deb Harley followed with her take on the Jose Feliciano hit “Light My Fire.” The juxtaposition of Harley, warm and buttery with her smooth alto vocal, paired with the red hot frenzied guitar fingering of Joe Cruz made for a mighty impassioned performance. Towards the end, Harley got quite vocally playful.
Speaking of playful, leave it to Rachel Kroog to make the diva of all entrances, channeling the anthem of disco music and outrageous hair, Kroog in an enormous afro wig befitting of Diana Ross, pranced her way on to the stage for Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” explaining “At first I was afraid of my hair.” She evenly worked both sides of the stage and while in the center was greeted with a dollar bill stuffed in her sequined bikini top from an enthusiastic fan from the audience. Fred Vagle mockingly got into the act donning a George Bush mask and upon greeting Kroog got the deserved brush off: “If you came here for the convention you’re too early,” she said of Bush, “and honey, you are in the wrong place.” Hilarious fun. Keel on saxophone, Nancy Stockhaus on bari-sax, and Anna Vagle, Joe Chouinard and ten Bensel on trumpets provided richly full instrumental sound to this disco number. Even upon finishing, Kroog kept the jocularity going by unexpectedly flipping her wig while taking a bow.
Leave it to Cyril Paul to deliver something radio friendly, that is if you’re from Trinidad. Lord Kitchener’s world beat composition “Bee’s Melody” got the musicians and the audience worked up for dancing and sure enough the traditional conga line formed from the audience to snake around the gymnasium as Act 1 (one hour and 45 minutes) came to a festive finish.
After a 25 minute break, a 35 minute raffle kicked off led by our Pastoral Ministry/Peace & Justice Coordinator Julie Madden, formerly blond and now red haired. She made note that the proceeds for this two night fundraiser go to SJA’s Justice Fund where nearly $100,000 was raised for 2006’s Cabaret. Reiterating the Cabaret Mission Statement, Madden responded, “Never doubt that a special group of people can throw a party that changes the world.”
Act II began with Mime artist Michael Hennessey performing what he titled Radio Mime. Using a First Date premise, he chose audience member Connie Cameron [Friday night photographer Bill Cameron’s wife] and she gamely participated in his romp of miming the silliness of first date jitters. Host/DJ Dan Chouinard returned announcing, “Welcome KSJA. We’ll be here all night long until sun up.” Bobby Schnitzer took his turn and rocked out on electric guitar with a bluesy, Latin-groove like composition “Bo Diddley” who eponymously named for himself this song as the title. The beat sounds quite familiar to The Strangelove’s 1965 hit “I Want Candy” which received attention as an MTV video and dance hit from 1982 by Bow Wow Wow. Drummer Peter Johnson exceptionally aided with driving that infectious steady beat.
A fun weather report spoof was read with droll dead-pan delivery by Madden who titled it Old Testament Weather and SJA people as “all contrarian, almost Unitarian.” Lee Vague continued the festive mood with Paul Simon’s 1981 delight “Late In the Evening,” a perfect choice for Vague to “Simon-esquely” croon while playing the guitar. Cruz and Schnitzer engaged in great guitar accompaniment as well. Russian folk singer Sima Shumilovsky performed the first verse of “Only You” in Russian and in English sang the second verse.
Dennis Spears, dressing like Elton John with white-rimmed glasses and ruffles, delivered the biggest surprise of the night, a heartfelt moving rendering of John’s 1976 classic “Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word” as Chouinard expertly accompanied with the melancholy piano arrangement. Quite an unusual song for Spears’ usually funky fare, he made the song his own, addressing each note with tender resignation.
Guitarist Billy McLaughlin and Carin Vagle performed a harmonious duet cover of Smokey Robinson’s “Cruisin’” and Vagle especially shone brightly with her passionate performance of Leonard Cohen’s 1984 Canadian hit “Dance Me to the End of Love” with husband Ben and father Fred on guitar and Chouinard lending sonically romantic heft with his accordion playing. A real crowd pleaser as Carin pushed to a great dynamic finish.
Steve Kremer turned the station/concert to a country channel with his Kingston Trio cover of “MTA.” Giving the song energetically vocal belting while strumming his guitar, Kremer was just a joy to be entertained by. Boyd Lee on banjo and Joe Cruz on ukulele accompanied tightly with a truly engaged audience who clapped right along. Accordion player Mark Stillman hammed it up with Del Shannon’s “Runaway” while guitarist Dean McGraw frenetically played a memorable “All Along the Watch Tower” and Jerry Rau played it direct and sincere with Bruce Springteen’s 1984 hit “My Home Town.” Even though I’ve got enormous love for the guitar, I would suggest for the shear sake of variety mixing the sequence of performers up so that four guitar acts are not formulaically lined up back to back.
T Mychael Rambo brought a breezy light swing to “We’re In This Together” with Deb Harley and Debbie Duncan providing able backup vocals to the closing number of the evening. Vague carried the melody line nicely with his guitar accompaniment and notable too was Keel’s saxophone solo. An encore of “Pilot of the Airwaves” led by Deb Harley, Rachel Kroog, Joe Chouinard and Steve Kremer followed by Kroog singing a verse of Donna Summer’s “On the Radio” and Duncan leading the entire cast with “Dancing in the Streets” as the finale closed.
What a show and what a concept it all was—AM Radio on the concert stage by the singer musicians of St. Joan of Arc. It was indeed Yesterday Once More but the flavor and feeling remain more often because these musicians keep returning to St. Joan’s. Be sure to check out St. Joan’s 2007-2008 Concert series.
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Acknowledgments for the Success of this year’s Cabaret
2007 Cabaret Planning Committee |