Dansker lecture on Jan. 12 to focus on Bernstein
By ALAN SMASON, Exclusive to the CCJN
For scholar and music enthusiast George Dansker, this year’s annual lecture on a Jewish musical figure has greater significance than in some of his previous years. For starters, the figure is Leonard Bernstein, the celebrated Broadway and classical composer, whose birthdate is enjoying a centennial this year. The title of the program is “Bernstein: Broadway and Beyond.” But, it’s also a return of sorts for Dansker, who featured Bernstein in his sophomore presentation in 2010 at Touro Synagogue.
Lyric soprano Sarah Jane McMahon performs next Friday night, Jan. 12, at Touro Synagogue as part of the “Bernstein: Beyond Broadway” lecture and program being led by George Dansker. (Photo by Alan Smason)
With the exception of two presentations, which concentrated on operas with Jewish connections like “La Juive,” all of his other seven lectures have concentrated on musical theatre figures like last year’s Richard Rodgers presentation or his very first outing in 2009 on Kurt Weill. Other famous composers and lyricists have included Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin, John Kander and Fred Ebb and Stephen Sondheim.
The concerts with introductory lectures by Dansker have been varied, but all have taken place at Touro Synagogue, although the “La Juive” presentation also enjoyed a repeat performance at Temple Sinai in 2013.
It’s also a return for Dansker to be paired with New Orleans native and heralded soprano Sarah Jane McMahon, who has been featured in many of his lectures. Dansker is grateful to work with her because her repertoire seems boundless. “She knows everything,” he boasts of her. And then there is her voice, accurate and graceful like a bird. “At this point in her life, Sarah Jane is very much a lyric (soprano),” he noted.
Also on the bill with Dansker is Jesse Reeks, a talented player, composer and arranger with a New Orleans musical pedigree. His father John, a clarinetist, was a founding member of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, while his mother was a singer and piano player for more than three decades at the piano bar at Pat O’Brien’s in the French Quarter.
Reeks provides accompaniment for singers like McMahon, but also has a few moments to shine on his own.
George Dansker, right, sings a tune with Jesse Reeks on piano. (Photo by Alan Smason)
“Where I get really creative is with Jesse, because I like for him to have one instrumental piece, so you can just focus on a melody,” he mused. “This year he’s going to do a fun one: ‘Make Our Garden Grow’ (from “Candide“).”
One of this year’s highlights will be a piece from “The White House Cantata,” a work that holds most of the music from Bernstein’s ill-fated musical “1600 Pennsylvania Avenue,” a musical about the history of the White House and the Presidents and First Ladies, who occupied it from the 19th to the 20th centuries. The show enjoyed 13 previews and 7 performances before Bernstein angrily closed the show due to very poor reception from critics and audiences.
McMahon will also perform the longest piece of the night “Island Magic” from Bernstein’s rarely-performed opera “Trouble in Tahiti,” according to Dansker.
Megan Kuckro, a soprano, will open the program with Bernstein’s “I Can Cook, Too” a song noted for its brassiness that was first made popular by Nancy Walker in 1944.
George Dansker Photo by Alan Smason)
Dansker is also looking forward to several other musical events in the coming months. The third Broadway-Con, a convention for Broadway enthusiasts will be held at the end of the month in the Jacob Javits Center in New York later, where he is looking forward to being a member of one of its panels on cast recordings of Broadway shows. It is titled “When the Golden Age of Television Met the Golden Age of Broadway.”
He will be one of the highly anticipated lecturers taking part in the music track for Limmud in mid-March, where he will concentrate again on Bernstein’s music with the course titled “Leonard Bernstein’s Broadway: A Centennial Celebration.” The course will be heavy on rare video presentations Dansker has secured for attendees.
Then, in April, he will journey to Weatherford, TX., the birthplace of Mary Martin of Broadway fame for the Mary Martin Event. “I’ve lectured there before… in 2014 for her centennial,” he noted. “They have a center there called The Doss Heritage and Cultural Center and it’s really beautiful. All of her papers, photographs, costumes and music scores – all that stuff – is in this collection.”
Dansker became an authority on the Mary Martin “Peter Pan” TV broadcasts of 1955 and 1956, which were re-released more than two years ago by VAI. Dansker will be speaking on a Mary Martin “Annie Get Your Gun” cast album that also starred John Raitt, which was released last month.
