![]() Santa Claus berating her annually absent husband, to the Fifth Avenue matron standing on a ledge trying to get the attention of her husband, to a Revolutionary War mother wondering if her son and husband’s service is worth the goal. Rolff, active in local theaters years ago before working nationally, shows a stunning range from the droll Mrs. ![]() Manuel, the founder of the fledgling Renegade Theatre and now director of theatre arts at Dillard High School, can bring the house down as the would-be basketball star or silence the audience as a dead soldier’s spirit in “Flying Home.” The show is comprised of 19 numbers, each delivered with such heart-wrenching honesty that it is unfair to spotlight any of them, but a sampling.…įirst among equals is Snow whose voice is simultaneously smooth liquid yet bravura in the anthem “I’m Not Afraid of Anything” in which the strong-minded heroine disses the fears of her friends and family, but realizes that her lover will always be afraid of committing completely, and therefore, none of these people will “get behind this wall.” She is a real discovery (locally) who we hope to hear more from. They inhabit people confessing, not performing. They act the hell out of the angst, ambivalence, fear and longing rather than just stand and deliver the notes as beautifully as they do. Manuel, Cecilia Snow, Timothy Michael Quinn and Heather Jane Rolff. True, the specifics of some set-ups aren’t clearly communicated (one may be Columbus singing as he sails to the new world) but that just makes them more universal.īut the cause for celebration is the performance of four mouth-droppingly talented and diverse cast members with breathtakingly rich voices in solo arias and mixed group efforts: Darius J. His metaphor is not lost on anyone when in the opening moments, an actress walks on a darkened stage illuminated only by the ghost light that guarded the theater for 18 months and her face glows with its welcome back warmth. Over and over, in dramatic or humorous situations, the characters are struggling with those conflicting hopes that it is “time to fly” and equally chastening experience as they face these choices – decisions that have long-range consequences.Īs usual, the production itself is seamlessly molded and guided by two expert hands: director-choreographer Patrick Fitzwater and musical director Eric Alsford helming this deceptively difficult work.įitzwater’s modest almost invisible staging includes some lively touches. It’s about hitting the wall and having to make a choice, or take a stand, or turn around and go back,” he wrote. ![]() ![]() A materialistic woman discovering that in rejecting less affluent suitors, she has settled for something less valuable as a trophy wife.ĭespite a wide range of musical styles, approaches and circumstances in its disparate episodes, the songs share a thematic core about choices… “that even when everything seems stable and certain, there is one moment that can upend and change anyone’s life. It might be a pregnant woman musing on her kinship with The Virgin Mary, or an inner-city teen dreaming of being a basketball star yet facing societal challenges. So it is with Jason Robert Brown’s brilliantly insightful and emotionally powerful Songs for a New World –- Slow Burn Theatre’s season opener that would be a triumph even if it didn’t also signify a full-throated celebratory return of regional theater.įar different than the large-scale, narrative epics that Slow Burn is best known for – the pandemic shuttered its much-anticipated Ragtime – 1995’s Songs for a New World is a four-person seven-musician “song cycle” meaning a curated collection of songs – not quite a revue, not quite a classic musical.īrown’s procession of songs is suffused with soaring melodies and passionate lyrics, but it’s the internal collision of hope, disappointment and perseverance that lands these often off-beat numbers because they echo the complex, conflicted depths of our souls, or at least those of people we know well. The late singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith once said an especially perceptive lyricist “must have been reading my mail.” And songstress Melissa Manchester once said that the best thing about performing music is it lets people know they’re “not going crazy all alone.” From a complex heart: Slow Burn Theatre’s Songs for a New World with Heather Jane Rolff, Timothy Michael Quinn, Darius J Manuel and Cecilia Snow/ Photo by Marjorie Vitalherne
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