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Barbara Cook Sounds 'Younger than Springtime' at 80th Birthday Philharmonic Concert |
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by Bruce-Michael Gelbert | >> see bio |
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| Barbara Cook courtesy of Jerry Kravat Entertainment Services |
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To celebrate her 80th birthday, which was on October 25, wonderful singer Barbara Cook was to give a single non-subscription birthday concert with the New York Philharmonic, at Avery Fisher Hall, on November 19. That sold out immediately after tickets went on sale, so they added a second, on the 20th, the one considered here. Now there is to be a third, in January, as well. Lee Musicker was the conductor, making his first appearances conducting the orchestra, and joining the Philharmonic's musicians were Ted Sperling on keyboard, James Saporito on percussion, and Peter Donovan on bass.
The festivities commenced with Leonard Bernstein's gay and glittering overture to "Candide," always a rousing way to begin an evening and with associations for the orchestra, for which Bernstein had served as Music Director, and for Cook, who created the role of Cunegonde on Broadway. Cook made her first appearance with the Philharmonic in February 1961, singing Cunegonde's "Glitter and Be Gay" at a gala honoring Bernstein, and had last performed with the orchestra as Sally in concert hearings of Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" on September 6 and 7, 1985.
At the birthday concert, the soprano entered and immediately received a standing ovation, the first of several that were in store for her. Continuing with Bernstein-and Comden and Green-in "Lucky to Be Me," her opening number, from "On the Town," with a sustained final note, Cook displayed a voice ever fresh and pure, belying her years, and it remained so throughout her performance. Announcing the she was "pleased to be singing with this great band up here," Cook went on with Al Jolson, Billy Rose and Dave Dreyer's "There's a Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder," a song that was first popular during her youth.
In timeless songs of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cook captured the heady blend of wonder, youth and love in "It Might as Well Be Spring," from "State Fair," and, from "South Pacific," delivered a fully enthusiastic "(I'm in Love with) A Wonderful Guy" and, displaying more than restraint than most in "This Nearly Was Mine," gave the song a gently rueful spin. She joyfully expressed simple satisfaction in Kern and Hammerstein's "Nobody Else But Me," written for a revival of "Show Boat." Her "Lover, Come Back to Me," from Romberg and Hammerstein's "The New Moon," was unconventionally up-tempo, swinging.
Cook embraced an existence free of airs and attitudes in a bouncy "Give Me the Simple Life," by Harry Ruby and Rube Bloom; looked, with surprise, at infatuation in "I Got Lost in His Arms," from Irving Berlin's "Annie Get Your Gun;" and got hot with George Gershwin and Irving Caesar's "Nashville Nightingale," which she had sung with Bobby Short. Weighed down with despair, she declared, "I'm Through with Love," in Kahn, Malnek and Livingston's song and, keeping the tone low key, sought to banish sadness with Turner, Parsons and Charlie Chaplin's "Smile (Though Your Heart Is Breaking)."
In songs by Sondheim, Cook probed disturbing, obsessive love in "I Wish I Could Forget (You)," from "Passion;" held out a beacon of hope with "No One Is Alone," from "Into the Woods;" and, pondering the mysteries of the universe, intriguingly paired the title song from Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson's "Lost in the Stars" with "No More (Questions, No More Tests)," from "Into the Woods."
Cook breezily offered inspiration to (animal) lovers with Caesar, Henderson and Yellen's "My Dog Loves Your Dog," popularized by Dorsey brothers Jimmy and Tommy, and concluded by preaching a sermon easy to agree with in Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer's "Accentuate the Positive." After the audience sang "Happy Birthday" to her, Cook returned to the score of "On the Town" for a clear and wistful "Some Other Time," as an encore, without amplification, which, of course, she never really needed.
Tickets, priced from $29 to 119, for Barbara Cook's concert with the Philharmonic on January 8 at 7:30 pm are available at the Avery Fisher Hall box office at Lincoln Center, by calling 212/875-5656, or by visiting www.nyphil.org.
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