So, what are you listening to these days?

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Only listening to the extraneous voice of the strump ET ... eliminated by many confined lines of conversation and thus the significant alternate doesn't see what's coming ... broader views of the spread of intelligence may be prerequisite ... to learning anything ... little more about everything! Thus limited knowledge systems ... bean all bosched up!

Alas I not supposed to speak of variants ... like alas; Ka! That's the abstract spirit from Egypt ... wandering the face of Ide ... the Great Alone?
 
I have this playing in my earbuds right now. NPR's Tiny Desk concerts are now Tiny Desk (Home) concerts. And this one's a doozy. It's John Fogerty and his kids playing a selection of his classics both CCR and solo. His voice is a bit huskier than when he was younger, but he nails those classic guitar licks as well as ever. And it looks like he bred his own backup band to boot.


I love it when he introduces his "desk" as a guitar case he used when CCR played Woodstock.
 
So, Fogerty kind of threw me there when he intro'd his daughter and said she was a high school senior. Given how long he's been around, he seems a bit old to have a teen still in the house. But, I checked Wiki and, yeah, he's 74 and Kelsey, Shane, Tyler, and their mother Julie (who was the camera operator for this show) are his second family. John also has three other kids (all quite grown up, obviously) from his first marriage.
 
Waterfall said:
Wow, never seen the two of them together before but I think Tom Jones just about kept up with Janis Joplin here:
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Nice performance. Not two people I would ever have expected to see working together but they played off each other quite well, I thought.
 
Back to Voces8. While the group's stock in trade is small group, a capella choral singing, they don't completely shy away from larger works. At least once a year, they team with their students (they have an educational program called the Voces8 Scholars) and a sister group, the Apollo 5 (who work out of Voces8's facilities and record on their label), to form a larger choir which then teams with the orchestra from the Academy of Ancient Music for larger works like Handel's Messiah and the Bach Passions (St. Matthew and St. John). Here's "Worthy is the Lamb" and the Amen from their 2018 Messiah. Voces8 music director Barnaby Smith is conducting.


And the Hallelujah Chorus from the same performance.


It's a surprisingly "big" Hallelujah given that the choir and orchestra are a fairly small group doing a "period" performance. Makes you realize just what a powerful piece this is that even without a modern choir and orchestra, it brings the house down.

And I smiled to see people standing for the Hallelujah, a tradition that allegedly goes back to the London premiere in 1743 when King George II supposedly rose for the Hallelujah Chorus, obliging all in attendance to do so as well. In fact, there is no documentary evidence that George II attended any of the performances and the earliest reference to standing comes from 1756. So the tradition of standing for the Hallelujah Chorus is based on a apocryphal story at best. (Interesting, Messiah initially stiffed in London after a successful debut in Dublin, Ireland).
 
Having mentioned Apollo 5, here's a sampling of their work. Similar to Voces 8 but with an even tighter, more intimate sound.

A contemporary choral work by Scottish composer Sir James Macmillan.


Renaissance religious music by 16th century English composer William Byrd.


And a favorite Scottish folk song.

 
Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber has certainly stepped up to help keep people entertained during Covid lockdown. He has been releasing his own piano versions of his its on his own channel, and started up The Show Must Go On, a Youtube channel where each week for a couple days, they post a complete film version of one of his shows. After each show, they leave a couple videos of songs from that show up. This week, it's the Lloyd-Webber tribute concert done a Royal Albert Hall several years.

However, one of the early ones (which I missed because I only found about the channel after it was on) was the Jesus Christ Superstar UK arena tour from 2012-13 which featured, among others, Tim Minchin as Judas. And, wow, this has got to be the most over-the-top production of "Superstar" I have ever come across. Minchin is just glorious in this performance.


And a couple weeks ago, it was the 2011 25th anniversary performance of my second favorite Lloyd-Webber show (Superstar comes first), The Phantom of the Opera. Now, I knew that Iranian-Canadian tenor Ramin Karimloo had been killing it as The Phantom back then but, to be honest, I've never really heard him sing the part. Let's just say I may have a new favorite Phantom and I say that as someone who saw the great British musical star Colm Wilkinson in the part when he played it in Toronto. Alas, they did not post Ramin's version of "Music of the Night", which is my favorite song from the show, but the spectacular title piece still shows him off quite nicely.

 
OMG, did I not go mad about the Arena version with Minchin a couple of years ago? I thought I had; certainly did at my house.
 
BetteTheRed said:
Also, "Chess" is my second fav Lloyd-Webber. Bit obscure, but some great tunes.
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Not Lloyd-Webber. It was Tim Rice as lyricist but the music was by Benny Anderssen and Bjorn Ulvaeus of ABBA. And, yes, it's a brilliant show. (I think I have pointed this out before). I wish Benny and Bjorn had done another original show instead of the ABBA mashup whose title escapes me. Entertaining as that was, it is not Chess.

I think you mentioned the Minchin version of JC Superstar when we were discussing the NBC TV version. That's where I thought I had heard of it when I saw the videos posted.
 
From the "I did not know that" file:

I am watching the 1998 celebration of Andrew Lloyd Webber (current free on The Shows Must Go On channel on Youtube) from Royal Albert Hall. And, to my surprise, nineties boy band Boyzone performed one of their hits, "No Matter What". Turns out it was written by Sir Andrew with American songwriter Jim Steinman (Meatloaf's "Anything for Love", Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart", and many, many more) for the musical Whistle Down the Wind and getting Boyzone to record it was basically a promo for the show.

 
Since Bette mentioned Chess upthread, here is one of the best songs from that show in a terrific version by two former Spice Girls. Context is that the ex-wife and the current partner of a Russian chess champion who defected to the West are singing about the man they both love.


Of all the songs in the show, this is perhaps the one that most clearly shows the ABBA connection. I would love to hear Agnetha and Anni-Frid sing it.
 
Back to Royal Albert Hall, one of the highlights has to be the performance of the title song from Phantom of the Opera. After the orchestra and Royal Albert Hall's organ kick things off with the instrumental version that serves as the show's overture, we then get a terrific rendition from Antonio Banderas and Sarah Brightman. Brightman, who was married to Andrew Lloyd-Webber briefly in the 80s, originated the role of Christine Daae on the original album and stage production back in 1986. Banderas has never actually played The Phantom (his Lloyd-Webber credentials are that he played Che in the film version of Evita) but actually does a pretty good job with the role here and he certainly looks like someone who could play the part.


After that, British stage star Michael Ball takes the role of Raoul and joins Brightman for the powerful love duet "All I Ask". Alas, they did not post this one. I was a bit disappointed anyway that they did not do the stage version where The Phantom lurks in the background and rages at what he says as Christine's betrayal of him at the end.
 
Pinga said:
I have been listening to music for services lately

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I have never used Baba Yetu in a service, but it would make a great, rousing anthem. Who would think it was written for a videogame (Civilization IV)?

The album Calling All Dawns, which includes the recorded version (which is a different choir from the game version), is generally a terrific album and landed Christopher Tin, the composer, a Grammy.
 
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