FRIDAY OCTOBER 26TH:
MU S IC
BY B RET T CA M P B EL L
Super Hero Dance Party
EXTRAVAGANZA
w/DJ Jordan Trainwreck
77 W. BROADWAY
541-342-3358
JOHNHENRYSCLUB.COM
SATURDAY OCTOBER 27TH:
OPEN
TUESDAY-SUNDAY
FROM 9PM - 2:30
ZOMBIE PROM
Church of Sk8in’
9pm • $5
EVERY SUNDAY NIGHT
EVERY THURSDAY NIGHT
EVERY WEDNESDAY NIGHT
HENRY’S
BOUNCE WITH
80’S NIGHT! JOHN
BROADWAY REVUE DJ SASSYMOUFF
REAL LIVE BURLESQUE
BILL CHARL AP
NO COVER FOR LADIES BEFORE 11 PM
FREE!
HALF PRICE ADMISSION FOR SERVICE INDUSTRY
0 WKHDWUH
& '21$/'
N Music is BETTER LIVE
:LOODPHWWH6WUHHWf'RZQWRZQ(XJHQHfPFGRQDOGWKHDWUHFRP
OCT
25
TIX
on sale
NOW
6:30 DRS
7:30 SHW
FRI
OCT
26
7PM DRS
7:30 SHW
OCT
29
TIX
on sale
NOW
16+ Ages
General Admission
7PM DRS
RS
8PM SHW
W
with 12th Planet, Caveat, and Anzo opening
NOV
7
16+ Ages
General Admission
7PM DRS
8PM SHW
TIX
on sale
NOW
NOV
11
..........
7PM DRS
8PM SHW
36
TIX
on sale
NOW
TIX AVAIL. BY CALLING 1-800-992-TIXX.
also avail. at
the EMU or online at
October 25, 2012 • eugeneweekly.com
mcdonaldtheatre.com
music is better live
STURDY SONGBOOK
Elvis Costello, Brahms and Shakespeare lead up
to Hallow’s Eve.
W
hen rock came along, it seemed to spell doom for the so-called Great
American Songbook, those perennials composed by (mostly) New York-
based songwriters from the 1920s through the mid 1950s. But those hardy
tunes keep finding new life in various guises, and not just in cabaret or
karaoke croon sessions. In Oregon, there’s no better evidence for their
robustness than The Shedd. On Saturday, Oct. 27, it brings back for the
fourth appearance the great jazz pianist Bill Charlap . The son of a Broadway composer
(Moose Charlap) and pre-rock pop singer (Sandy Stewart), Charlap has over the past 15
years managed to find new life in those old songs and others, and his impeccable, energetic
performances demonstrate their lasting power.
Many of those classic tunes originated in stage musicals or films, and next Thursday and
Sunday (Nov. 1 and 4), The Shedd features a sort of repurposing that brings many of the
songs back to the place of their birth — the stage — but in a new context. Singer-actress
Shirley Andress and stage director Richard Jessup take 18 songbook classics (by Harold
Arlen, the Gershwins and also tunes from recent musicals and contemporary songwriters,
like Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach’s “God Give Me Strength”) to create a new, scripted,
jukebox musical-style, one-woman show that traces a character’s emotional journey from
despair to hope.
You can hear classic stage music in close to its original context this Friday, Oct. 26,
when Cascadia Concert Opera gives its final performance of Otto Nicolai’s comic opera,
The Merry Wives of Windsor, at LCC’s Ragozzino Hall. But rather than a fully staged
production, the company is presenting a concert version of Shakespeare’s Falstaffian farce
with piano accompaniment, a nine-member cast featuring singer-actors from around
California and Oregon and an eight-member chorus. It’s a treat to see this plucky,
accomplished outfit expanding its reach from small venues to larger spaces.
I mentioned that Bill Charlap comes from a musical family, and in fact he’s married to
another fine jazz pianist (Renee Rosnes). On Sunday, Nov. 4, another accomplished musical
couple appears in the University of Oregon’s ChamberMusic@Beall series. Longtime
Emerson Quartet cellist David Finckel and pianist Wu Han not only perform and record (11
CDs) together; they also direct the presitigious Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center
and Music@Menlo festival. In their Beall Hall concert, they’ll play an excellent program
of sonatas by Beethoven (one of his finest chamber works), Debussy (ditto), Brahms and
Shostakovich.
Speaking of intimate sounds, on Monday, Oct. 29, at Springfield’s Wildish Theater, the
excellent local players of Chamber Music Amici perform a classic, Brahms’s breakthrough
Piano Quartet No. 1, and a rarity worth hearing by one of his friends: Austrian composer
Heinrich von Herzogenberg’s String Trio No. 2, which bears distinct Brahmsian and
Beethovenian influences.
Back at the UO, the season is in full swing with several recommended concerts. This
Sunday, Oct. 28, the student Tardis Ensemble play 20th-century music that responds to
poetic words and images by Copland, Barber, Britten and more at the Jordan Schnitzer
Museum of Art. The same afternoon, the University Symphony’s first program under
conductor David M. Jacobs at Beall Hall includes a short work by the rising young
Princeton composer Chris Rogerson (who’s studied with composers from Aaron Kernis to
Jennifer Higdon), Dvorak and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. Also at Beall, you can hear
a ton o’ tubas on Oct. 31’s OcTUBAfest , and a heap o’ harpies on Nov. 3’s Harp Day ,
including a concert featuring Corvallis composer-harpist Julia Kay Jamieson . There’s new
music by UO students on Nov. 6’s free Oregon Composers Forum concert and on Nov. 7,
the marvelously monikered New York-based Genghis Barbie , “the leading post post-
feminist feminist all-female horn experience,” plays arrangements of pop music from the
’70s to today — sort of a Portland Cello Project for horny women.
Finally, on All Hallow’s Eve (Oct. 31), try Mood Area 52’s annual live performance of
their original, tango-fueled live score (cello, accordion, guitar, bass, drums, cornet, toy
piano) to F.W. Murnau’s classic silent vampire flick Nosferatu at the Bijou Art Cinemas. It’s
always a neat trick, and a treat to boot. ■