10 THE OBC AND BROADWAY

Repertoire

COLE PORTER: Kiss me kate. Overture

COLE PORTER: Kiss me kate. Another Openin’ Another Show

COLE PORTER: Kiss me kate. So In Love

COLE PORTER: Kiss me kate. Where is the Life that late I led

RICHARD RODGERS: The boys from Syracuse. This Can’t be Love/Falling in Love with Love

LEONARD BERNSTEIN: West side story. Tonight

LEONARD BERNSTEIN: West side story. Maria

LEONARD BERNSTEIN: West side story. A Boy Like That

LEONARD BERNSTEIN: West side story. America

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ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER: The Phantom of the Opera. The Phantom of the Opera.

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER: The Phantom of the Opera. All I Ask of You

ANDREW LLOYD WEBER: Evita. Don’t Cry For Me Argentina

IRVING BERLIN: Annie get your gun. There’s No Business Like Show Business

IRVING BERLIN: Annie get your gun. Anything You Can Do

COLE PORTER: High Society. Well Did You Evah!

CLAUDE-MICHEL SCHONBERG: Les Miserables. Empty Chairs at Empty Tables

CLAUDE-MICHEL SCHONBERG: Les Miserables. I dreamed a Dream

CLAUDE-MICHEL SCHONBERG: Les Miserables. One Day More

Artists

ORQUESTRA SIMFÒNICA DE BARCELONA I NACIONAL DE CATALUNYA (OBC)
Robert Purvis, conductor
Singers from London’s West End:
Deborah Myers
Louisa Lydell
Ian Virgo
John Addison
Adrian der Gregorian

Program

Passed through the filter of jazz, swing and the rhythms of the thirties, Shakespeare’s dramas inspired many of the Broadway classics. Now the OBC revisits and recovers the classic music of XXth century America.Shakespeare’s influence is not limited solely to symphonic and operatic world. For decades, from the mid XXth century, Broadway has been the epicentre of contemporary Shakespearean drama. The musical is not a minor genre and it has given us masterpieces of musical tradition that are far from mere entertainment. This applies, for example, to West Side Story, incomparable work of composer and pianist Leonard Bernstein, taking the raw narrative of a Romeo and Juliet adapted to the struggles of the New York neighbourhoods of the sixties. The same is true of the fantastic Kiss me, Kate by the genius Cole Porter, which makes a free version of The Taming of the Shrew, or of The Boys from Syracuse, which is an adaptation of The Comedy of Errors. These traditional forms are transmuted into later works when the Broadway musical imports the twists and aesthetic trends characteristic of American pop rock of the eighties and nineties. At this point, there is the emblematic figure of Andrew Lloyd-Webber, author of classics that have monopolized the billboard on 42nd Street for decades, for example, The Phantom of the Opera or Evita. Despite using amplified voices, the narrative structure of musicals and their orchestral texture are sisters of the opera. And not surprisingly, these musicals have popularized songs like All I Ask of You, There’s No Business Like Show Business or the über-famous Maria, which have subsequently been performed by many opera singers.