The Songs of Michael Leonard

Time for yet another "once in a lifetime" event. How do these New Yorkers stand it??

This intimate "boite" on 22nd St. was packed to the rafters for a celebration of composer Mickey Leonard entitled "Variations in Search of a Theme". Leonard is probably best known in theatre circles for providing the score (with lyrics by Herbert Martin) of the 3 performance Broadway flop, THE YEARLING which starred David Wayne in 1965. Fortunately, a young singer named Barbra Streisand recorded several of the songs including "I'm All Smiles", "My Pa" and "Why Did I Choose You?" ensuring that Leonard's beautiful music would reach a wider audience. (For instance...us.) His other collaborators have included Carolyn Leigh, Marshall Barer, Barbara James and Annie Lebow, he is a film composer and an arranger for artists as diverse as Nancy Sinatra and the pianist Bill Evans, and he was musical supervisor and orchestrator on the original Broadway production of GREASE.

Produced by singer Karen Oberlin and her husband, author David Hadju, the evening began with an overture of the gentle jazz waltz "Teach Me How To Dance" played by four of New York's finest musicians: Jon Weber on piano, Warren Vache on cornet, Tom Hubbard on bass and Gene Bertoncini on guitar (whose cell phone rang in his pocket while he was onstage. Fortunately, nobody noticed.)

Karen Oberlin followed with "Don't Let a Good Thing Get Away" (lyric by Carolyn Leigh) before she introduced jazz great Mark Murphy, now almost 80 and in frail health but whose highly individual scat-singing take on "I'm All Smiles" brought down the house.

The elegant, classically trained Ellen Bullinger (who has her own Michael Leonard cabaret which she has performed with the composer) sang "Where Do The Lonely Go?"

before pianist Bill Zeffero performed a cute number cut from THE YEARLING called "Moonshine".
Ingenue Marissa Mulder sang of "Spring"

and Karen Oberlin joined with Ellen Bullinger for a beautiful wordless duet of the gorgeous bossa nova "The Time Has Come". A breath of fresh air hit the stage with the effervescent Barbara Brussell who truly inhabited every syllable of another gem from THE YEARLING, "The Kind of Man Every Woman Needs".

Musical director Jon Weber played "Lullaby For Nathan", composed as a christening present for Oberlin and Hajdu's little boy Nate, and a message of good luck was read out from Nancy Sinatra.
The serene Maude Hixson, another performer who specialises in the Michael Leonard repertoire, presented two songs with a similar theme...

"Childhood's End", about discovering toys and mementos in an attic, and another song cut from THE YEARLING called "Growing Up". The next artist is a particular fave of mine whose recordings were introduced to me by my darling friend Deidre Rubenstein so I was thrilled to finally see her perform in person...Miss Joyce Breach.

She mesmerised the room with a song from her latest album ODDS AND ENDS called "Not Exactly Paris", the absolute epitome of the sophisticated Manhattan cabaret performer. If we'd been drinking martinis we'd have ordered twelve more .    Karen Oberlin duetted with guitarist Gene Bertoncini on "Everything Beautiful" before the manic Mark Nadler hit the stage running to attempt a very funny piece of material (apparently under-rehearsed) about being trapped on a disastrous cruise ship called "Let Me Off This Boat".

The wondrous Barbara Brussell returned with "Tame Me" a song written 'on spec' for the character of the Fox for the movie THE LITTLE PRINCE (Lerner and Loewe got the gig). And finally, beloved chanteuse K. T. Sullivan closed the programme with THE YEARLING's best loved song "Why Did I Choose You?"

As an added bonus, Mickey Leonard himself was invited to take to the piano where he presented an imagined  musical encounter set in a tavern in Leipzig in 1740 where J.S. Bach finds himself at a table sharing a drink with jazz pianist Bill Evans. Their discussion is written in each musician's style, with Bach reassuring Evans with the final word:
"If you'll pardon this old man
Make your music while you can.
In the end they'll all applaud
Music is the gift of God."

A moving finish to a special evening. The event will be repeated once more in February with some different material and a slightly different cast (including Sandy Stewart and Rex Reed!!) so if you're in town, put it in your diary. If not, drag out that old Streisand album and pretend.