Happy Birthday Barbara Cook

Born October 25,1927 Barbara Cook celebrated her birthday last Saturday and I was there.  I was so busy cheering I forgot to take my camera out until she was walking off the stage.  She walked off with Carnegie Hall that night.  85 years old and she sounds as silvery sweet as always.  My favorites were an a Capella version of 'House of the Rising Sun', 'If I love Again' by Jack Murray and Ben Oakland and her first Hoagy Carmichael song 'The nearness of you' with her wonderful accompanist Ted Rosenthal.  She talked about not having sung certain composers because she didn't think their music matched what she does.  The one surprise was Cole Porter.  She then added country music as not a rich source;  although she was intrigued by some of their titles: 'I'm so miserable now it's as though you were here', 'If only my nose ran money, but it's not'.  Her encore was an unamplified 'Imagine'.  One of her guests was the mezzo-soprano Susan Graham who did an a Cappella version of 'Til There Was You'.  I was so impressed I bought 2 of her CDs.  The orchestra seats were expensive and worth every penny. 

Ivanov at CSC

The Classic Stage Company on East 13th Street is one of my favorite Repertory Theaters in New York.  It is small and inexpensive.
As a side note the New York Times reports that the new production of 'Glengarry Glen Ross', starring Al Pacino has sold out it's 4 previews.  The top price is $350 and the average price is $164.47.  I had a third row aisle seat for $60.
They do classic and new works with exceptional casts.  Ivanov, by Anton Chekov starred Ethan Hawke and Joely Richardson [daughter of Vanessa Redgrave and Tony Richardson] and was directed by Austin Pendleton.  The famous quote: 'if you show a gun in the first act it must be used in the second act' is from a letter of Chekov's and concerns this play.  Yeah, it's not a comedy and at 90 minutes with one 10 minute break it could literally be a pain in the ass, but it's not.  Ivanov is too interesting a character.  He is described by most critics as the typical melancholy Russian.  He is, for me the existential man.  His suicide proceeds naturally from his deep, generalized discontent, and that suicide reinforces my negative feelings about existentialism in general.  I am not a student of that philosophy and have only read the novels of existentialists not their theoretical writings.  I may very well be talking through my hat but if life is 'meaningless' and since every life has pain and suffering why not commit suicide.  Back to the play.  What struck me about Ivanov, the man, who is a  'good' man as commented by everyone, is how extremely cruel he can be.  His inertia masks a great rage, and that may be the nature of suicide.
Ivanov was translated by Carol Rocamora and the cast includes Glenn Fitzgerald, Annette Hunt, Stephanie Janssen, Roberta Maxwell, George Morfogen, James Patrick Nelson, Anthony Newfield, Juliet Rylance, Jonathan Marc Sherman, Anne Troup, Louis Zorich. 
This weeks New Yorker cover: