Edward Elgar / Song and Dance

On this day in classical music: March No. 5 Sir Edward Elgar recorded his “Pomp and Circumstance March No. 5” in 1930. The last of the five stirring marches (although he had begun work on a sixth) was dedicated to Elgar’s friend Percy C. Hull. More than two decades separate the fourth and fifth marches. The brilliantly orchestrated fifth march is instantly recognizable as a work by Elgar. Listen to the Orchestra Filarmonica Di Lucca (Italy) perform Elgar’s fifth Pomp and Circumstance March. Andrea Colombini conducts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqzyyQyezVc

 On this day in the musical theatre: Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical “Song and Dance” opened on Broadway in 1985. The production starred Bernadette Peters as Emma, a young hat designer living in New York who always seems to fall in love with the wrong man. As the musical’s title illustrates, the first act is told entirely through song while the second unfolds through dance. The second half was a ballet choreographed to “Variations,” a work based on Paganini’s “Caprice in A Minor” that Lloyd Webber composed for his cellist brother. Peters won a Tony Award for her role as Emma. Listen to Peters perform “Unexpected Song.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrKQM4apzPw 

Musical musings: (The London production of) Song and Dance had done well — it had run for 795 performances — but there was something unsatisfactory about it. All the deficiencies of the original album — the mawkish story, the heroine’s unattractive personality, exacerbated by (Marti) Webb’s mediocre singing — still obscured the Song half, and when Song and Dance finally came to New York on September 18, 1985, it was with a drastically rewritten book and lyrics by (Don) Black and the American lyricist and stage director Richard Maltby, Jr. Reviewing the London version in The Financial Times, Michael Coveney offered: “It is a very long time since I have sat through a more ostentatious, less theatrically coherent evening.” Maltby knew he had a big job on his hands, not the least of which was to adapt, change, and throw out, if need be, large chunks of Black’s original text. It came as no surprise to Lloyd Webber that the show should fail to find favor with Frank Rich of The New York Times. “Empty material remains empty, no matter how talented those who perform it,” Rich began. “As is this composer’s wont, the better songs are reprised so often that one can never be quite sure whether they are here to stay or are simply refusing to leave.” The critic did, however, have kind words for Peters, an actress beyond criticism in New York. Rich’s view was echoed by most other major critics: loved her, hated it. – Michael Walsh, writing in Andrew Lloyd Webber: His Life and Works

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