Irish Timeswriters review a selection of events.
The Fantasticks
Mill Studio, Dundrum
By Gerry Colgan
The Fantasticks, by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt, is claimed to be the longest running musical in the history of American theatre, since its premiere in 1960. It is suffused with a charming simplicity of story and memorable songs.
Two fathers build a wall between their houses, ostensibly to keep their son and daughter apart. The parents are in fact indulging in some wayward matchmaking, predicated on the theory that to deny the young couple is the surest way to bring them together - cue song Never Say No. Later, they have to justify their own reconciliation. Enter the worldly El Gallo, who arranges a sham kidnapping of Lisa so that she can be rescued by hero Matt, and all can share in the jubilation. But when the wall is down, and the lovers see each other more clearly, their youth betrays them. He goes off to sow a few wild oats, she falls for El Gallo. With fingers burned, they return to each other.
The lead songs are tuneful and atmospheric, well integrated into the story. Try To Remember, Soon It's Gonna Rain, Love, You Are Loveand They Were Youwould make any musical memorable, and they are buttressed with other catchy numbers throughout.
The Dublin Lyric Players, in association with Symco, are directed by Conor O'Malley. As the young couple, Clare O'Malley and Peter Brooke-Tyrrell are a joy, already substantial talents. Barry Kavanagh is an authoritative El Gallo, and Michael Thornton, Jim Reid, John Walsh, Gary Finnegan and Roseanne Lynch fill the smaller roles with confidence. Karen Lynch accompanies them on the piano.
It would be a pity to miss this nostalgic musical miniature.
(Ends Sat)
Albert Hammond jnr
The Village, Dublin
By Laurence Mackin
The Strokes may have lit up the pop sky at the turn of the century with Is This It, but they've been somewhat less stellar of late. As musical fashions have swung back over to this side of the Atlantic, they have had to work harder to keep themselves perched on the cusp of the zeitgeist. So what better time to set up a solo sideshow that'll keep things ticking over nicely?
That could be a bit harsh on Albert Hammond jnr, but it is difficult to separate the man from the band in this case. The Strokes' hallmarks are all there: the slugging, throbbing bass, the punky, lean guitar lines and the drawled Noo Yawk vocal. But it seems a little incomplete. The tracks are a touch thin on meat, and seem to reference other influences a little too closely. Scaredowes a debt to Elliott Smith, Everyone Gets a Starsounds suspiciously like Idaho band Built to Spill, Blue Skiesis a close shave of the Beatles' Don't Let Me Down, and guitarist Steve Schiltz must have Thin Lizzy's Live and Dangerousin his collection. It's not that these tracks are terrible, by any measure: Hammond gets a rapturous response from the crowd and keeps the pulse high throughout the gig. The band look every inch a part of the New York hipster set, with skinny jeans, big hair and just the right degree of elegantly wasted dishevelment in place.
But, on the music front, there is not a lot of originality at work, and there are others, such as Jesse Malin, who pull this off in superior fashion.
These songs appear written more with the head than the heart, and with an ear for the charts. Live, it's a solid enough tour through the New York City soundscape, but the landmarks are a little too familiar. A competent enough outing, then, but hardly the master stroke that suggests a successful solo career is an inevitability.
Eric Sweeney (organ)
St Michael's, Dún Laoghaire
By Michael Dervan
Eric Sweeney- The Bright Seraphim, , Mass of St Patrick (exc). Ives- Adeste Fidelis in an organ prelude. Variations on America. Philip Glass - Satyagraha(exc). Messiaen- Combat de la Mort et de la Vie (exc).
Composer Eric Sweeney can be relied upon to produce highly individual programmes when he presents himself as an organ recitalist. Here, he juxtaposed works of his own with pieces by Charles Ives, Philip Glass and Olivier Messiaen.
The two Ives pieces date from the 1890s. Adeste Fidelisin an organ prelude shows the composer in challenging, forward-looking mode. The Variations on America(a tune better known on this side of the Atlantic as God Save the Queen) find him at his cheekiest.
Sweeney responded as well to the strange dissonances of the first as to the broad humour and irreverence of the second, even down to using the Rieger organ's Cymbelstern in the third variation and playing mostly in time with its chimes.
He delighted in the wallpaper patterns of the Michael Riesman/Donald Joyce arrangement of the finale of Philip Glass's opera Satyagraha. He was less successful in Combat de la Mort et de la Viefrom Messiaen's Les Corps glorieux. He played just the concluding slow section of this movement and allowed the music to sound rather too plain.
Sweeney is the Irish composer to have adopted minimalist practices with greatest enthusiasm. The pieces of his own which he offered, The Bright Seraphim, Adventus and three movements from his recent Mass of St Patrick, blended these practices with a strong flavour of French organ showmanship. He delivered them with spirit and energy.
