PITTSBURGH SYMPHONY Pops program proves orchestra's power, versatility

With speed, precision and wit, the music came alive.
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra seems to be one of the more underrated orchestras in the country.
It showed this last February with a better than world class performance of Shostakovich's First Violin Concerto with violinist Sarah Chang, and then showed its true quality and versatility Monday at the Scottish Rite Cathedral in New Castle in a Pops program in the best tradition of Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops.
Monday night's feature was "Pops Goes British." This was a program of English stage and music hall tunes from the 19th Century to the present. Although there were selections from Gilbert and Sullivan and other 20th Century British musicals, the emphasis was on the music of that giant of recent times, Andrew Lloyd-Webber.
"Pops Goes British" has been performed with orchestras from Ottawa, Ontario, to Atlanta, Georgia, and to Portland, Ore. It was arranged by the very talented Maestro Jack Everly, the pops conductor of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and music director of the recently formed Symphonic Pops Consortium, a group of six major American orchestras.
Kicking it off
The evening opened with an overture arranged by Everly. It was a series of rapidly changing cuts of British music beginning with Rule Britannia and ranging from Gilbert and Sullivan to Edward Elgar.
This was then followed by selections from the great musicals of London's West End, plus a few others from popular British music of the past. These included, in addition to the music of Lloyd Webber's music, the overture to "The Mikado" by Gilbert and Sullivan, plus Lionel Bart's "Consider Yourself" and "As Long as He Needs Me" from "Oliver!"; "Written in the Stars" from Elton John's "Aida"; and "Down Abbey Road," based on music of The Beatles.
There was also an amusing set of London old music hall acts.
The concert featured five Broadway veterans, Judy McLane, Gwendolyn Jones, Jennifer Shrader, Mark Nadler, and Ted Keegan. Their combined credits include "The Phantom of the Opera," "Beauty and the Beast," "42nd Street," "Evita," "Nine," "Chess," "Mamma Mia!"
Keegan has performed in "Phantom of the Opera" more than 1900 times. While he did sing selections from that musical, he also sang a tribute to Anthony Newley with "What Kind of Fool Am I?" Jones delighted the audience with a crisp, cockney patter, then gave a touching rendition of "As If We Never Said Goodbye" from "Sunset Boulevard." Nadler was quite amusing in a medley of Victorian-era music hall tunes.
Many of Andrew Lloyd Weber's songs require a voice of an operatic timbre, and Shrader supplied that quality McLane's voice is pure Broadway in the best traditions of Mary Martin and others of that classic mid 20th Century period.