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In Harmony
Presented by: SLAMS Musical Theatre Company
Venue: Knox Road Theatre
Reviewer: Christian Cavallo
Date Reviewed: Friday 6th February 2009
On Friday 6th of February, I made the trek down to
Bayswater to see SLAMS’ In Harmony. As someone who loves his
harmonies, I knew that I’d probably be on the critical side of
things if the cast didn’t live up to the show’s title.
When I walked into the theatre, I thought I was at a funeral. I
immediately noticed a coffin centre front of the black furnished
stage. The cast emerged from the wings and opened the show with a
clever acapella arrangement of ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’, the theme
from 2001: A Space Odyssey. I felt this was a great way to
start the show. It was both something different, to open a concert
with, and with its strong use of dynamics, enabled the 29-strong
cast to set the tone for the night. This transitioned into ‘The
Circle of Life’ from The Lion King, which they sang around
the coffin changing, making the song one of mourning. This changed
towards the end as a new baby was born and so illustrating a more
complete ‘circle of life’. As the first real number of the night, it
was a good indication of what was to come. The soloists, Danny
Medica and Amara Jensen were strong but were unfortunately
overpowered by the rest of the cast singing behind them. This was a
recurring problem for lead vocalists in numbers such as ‘The Gods
Love Nubia’ from Aida, ‘Shadowland’ from The Lion King
and ‘No One Mourns the Wicked’, from Wicked. This problem
could have been overcome had they used microphones. The ensemble
singing behind the main vocalists were constantly amazing to listen
to. The harmonies, the dynamics and arrangements of all of the
choral work were stunning. Congratulations to Musical Director Glenn
Barnett on his work here.
What I started to realise over subsequent numbers was that the
musical theatre songs were not sung in their original contexts. I
felt that Mark Woods as director chose went about this in an
innovative way to approach staging some of the numbers. I am not
usually a huge fan of concerts for the very reason that songs are
often staged out of their original context. This can take away from
their meaning, and to someone who is unfamiliar with the original
context, it can leave them confused about the song’s meaning. This
‘out-of-context’ staging choice complemented the lyrics, and helped
make many of the songs stand alone. One example is the setting of
the perennial favourite Les Miserables anthem ‘Do You Hear
The People Sing’. It was set inside a tram complete with newspapers,
iPods and an overcrowded peak hour rush. I have to admit that
although I was one of the few that laughed throughout the song, it
worked a treat and I enjoyed the humorous approach to the number and
the clever way they still managed to depict an oppressed society.
There were, however some times where I felt the overall direction
was overlooked. It was irritating watching chairs being set up
during a beautiful choral arrangement of ‘You Raise Me Up’. During
‘Cantique de Jean Racine’ (Gabriel Faure) the action played out made
little sense and upstaged the stunning vocal delivery of this choral
piece. Considering the vocal intricacies of this number, I would
have preferred to see the piece set in stillness so as to highlight
the French vocal as the feature.
With 30 numbers in the three acts on the programme, I would have to
say that there were some that didn’t quite hit the mark and that
could have possibly been cut, if only to maintain the high standard
set from numbers such as those I have previously mentioned. ‘The
Morning of the Dragon’ from Miss Saigon was sloppy in
contrast to other choral pieces and is one example of this. It also
appeared that when there were the fewer people on stage at any given
time, they looked less confident than when the greater ensemble came
together. ‘The Bitch of Living’ from Spring Awakening seemed
very under-rehearsed with pitch problems evident throughout. I
initially thought it was maybe a ‘boy thing’, but I was pleasantly
surprised by the same boys who later reappeared in a smoking
rendition of ‘Is you Is’ from Five Guys Named Moe and
‘Sherry’ from Jersey Boys. In particular I need to point out
Danny Medica’s exceptional falsetto work in ‘Sherry’, and the four
guys in this number who complemented each other and executed their
choreography with a cheeky gusto.
This production as a whole was a mammoth effort. Other highlights
included Gavin Dean’s comical outburst into ‘Mah Na Mah Na’, the
drum quartet in ‘Seize the Day’ from Newsies, a powerful
‘Alabanza’ from In The Heights, ‘Joyful Joyful’, with lovely
solo vocals from Julia Roper and Kate Burns’ opening to ‘Mama! Who
Bore Me’ from Spring Awakening. I applaud the production team
for the wide variety of genres they brought together. I personally
thought that the majority of the ensemble performances and their
arrangements made the night. With the emphasis being on ensemble
work, I found this a breath of fresh air in comparison to other
concerts I have seen in the past. For a show called In Harmony,
it successfully lived up to its name.
Originally
from Geelong, Christian has performed in a wide variety of
including, ‘The Lion’ and ‘The Tinman’ in two productions of
The Wizard
of Oz, ‘Tommy’ in Annie Get Your Gun, ‘Nick’ in Fame,
‘Marius’ in Les Misérables, ‘Michael’ in The Witches of
Eastwick and ‘Billy’ in Anything Goes.
Since moving to Melbourne in 2007 to study Graphic Design at RMIT
University, he has performed with Whitehorse Music Theatre in A
Chorus Line as ‘Paul’ and as a ‘Wickersham Brother’ in
Seussical. He was ‘Eddie’ in CLOC’s Blood Brothers and
‘Austin’ in I Love You Because with SHooSH! Productions and
most recently ‘Danny’ in PLOS’s Grease.
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