The music the group makes is as original and as attention-getting as its name.
Last year, a little known new-music vocal octet came out of nowhere to win the Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance.
If that group had been called, say, the Contempo Voices or Sounds of Today, or something more or less conventional like that, it might have had a slightly tougher time coming to the attention of the restless Grammy voters.
But in fact the group is called Roomful of Teeth. And the music it makes is as original and as attention-getting as its name.
Thursday, February 5, Roomful of Teeth will perform at the University of Hartford’s Hartt School, on the school’s Richard P. Garmany Chamber Music Series. (Full disclosure: I am the curator of the series.) The concert will be in Millard Auditorium at 7:30 pm.
Although their publicity material is a little cozy about it, the group’s name derives from a throwaway line in the largely throwaway 1942 film “The Road to Morocco,” which was the third in the Bob Hope/Bing Crosby/Dorothy Lamour series of “road” pictures. (Of far greater cultural significance than the line is that the movie introduced the great Jimmy Van Heusen/Johnny Burke standard “Moonlight Becomes You.”)
As the name, and the origin of the name, implies, the group has a playful side. But its main mission in life is to present the widest possible range of vocal techniques, vocal sounds and above all new and captivating vocal repertoire of various traditions and countries, of which there seems to be a virtually infinite supply.
Since its founding in 2009, and especially since winning the Grammy, the group has been among the most active and certainly most visible of American contemporary music ensembles.
Some of its distinctive repertoire comes from within its own ranks.
For instance, one of the group’s altos, Caroline Shaw, is a violinist and composer as well as a singer. In April of 2013 she became, at 30, the youngest person in history to receive the Pulitzer Prize for composition. The prize was awarded for her piece “Partita for 8 Voices,” written expressly for Roomful and featured on the group’s debut album. The piece will be performed on the Garmany concert.
The Garmany program will also include several other works written by Roomful members.
Not to shamelessly hype the event, but tickets are going quickly, so I would urge you to go on the Hartt website, or call the box office -- (860) 768-4228) -- to avoid disappointment.
As is the new custom with the Garmany concerts, there is a pre-concert reception in the Millard lobby from 6:00 pm to 7:00 pm, featuring a cash wine/beer bar and free hors d'oeuvres.
And after the concert, all ticket holders are invited to remain for cookies and coffee and a chance to greet the artists.
A Facebook Challenge Forthrightly Met
A while ago on Facebook, somebody was asking for people to name the best pop songs derived from a classical source. I didn’t get sucked in at the time, but I didn’t entirely forget about the question.
So, in the hope that it might stir up a little reader reaction, and with the disclaimer that this is the result of approximately ten minutes of reflection – any more than that is to violate the spirit of these things -- I offer a handful of specimens that I think hold up pretty well:
1. “Night,” by Jackie Wilson.
This may actually be the least-known, but if so it’s a shame because it’s possibly the single best example of this genre. It’s Jackie’s soulful, string-rich 1960 treatment of Saint-Saens’s “Mon coeurs’ouvre a tavoix,” (usually translated as My Heart at Thy Sweet Voice), from his opera "Samson and Delilah.” Some people say, and I’m one of them, that had Jackie lived he would have been the heir to Sinatra. This record would be Exhibit A.
2. “If You Are But a Dream,” by Frank Sinatra.
A lot of singers eventually recorded this tune, but Frank’s 1944 version was definitive. The song, based on a piano piece by the minor Russian composer Anton Rubinstein, is used to nice effect in Woody Allen’s “Radio Days.”
3. “Stranger in Paradise,” from the 1953 musical “Kismet” by Wright and Forrest.
The main refrain is a note-for-note lift from Borodin’s“Polovtsian Dances,” from his epic opera “Prince Igor.” To give credit where it’s due, however, the bridge of the song – and a very lilting one it is – was not stolen from Borodin.
4. “Never Gonna Fall in Love Again,” by Eric Carmen.
I know, I know – this is a real piece of pop junk. But as pieces of pop junk go, it’s strangely well crafted. The refrain here is purloined from the swooning slow movement of Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2. The verse section seems to be original. I like it – what can I tell you?
5. “Once Upon a Dream,” from the Disney animated film version of “Sleeping Beauty.”
It’s based, of course, on Tchaikovsky’s famous waltz for his own “Sleeping Beauty” ballet. Last year, Lana del Rey offered up a spooky, post-apocalyptic version of this song for the film “Maleficent,” which, oddly enough, was also a Disney product.
So those are my big five. For today, at least. What am I leaving out?
A Faithful Keeper of the Flame
I recently received news that Eleanor Anderson, widow of the celebrated composer Leroy Anderson, had died a couple of months ago, at age 96.
Leroy, composer of “Sleigh Ride,” “The Syncopated Clock,” “The Typewriter,” “Serenata,” “The Waltzing Cat” and many other classic miniatures of American music, died in 1975 at the age of 66. Since the early 50s, the Andersons had lived in Woodbury.
I was honored to have been chosen by Eleanor to contribute to “Leroy Anderson: A Bio-Bibliography” (Greenwood Press) and several other projects. She was a great and gracious champion of her husband’s music and legacy. RIP, Eleanor Anderson.
Steve Metcalf was The Hartford Courant’s fulltime classical music critic and reporter for over 20 years, beginning in 1982. He is currently the curator of the Richard P. Garmany Chamber Music Series at The Hartt School. He can be reached at spmetcalf55@gmail.com
