DECEMBER 18, 1998 GAY PEOPLE's ChronicLE 15
Four holiday discs from the gayer side of the rack
by Jeffrey Newman
From Babyface and Cyndi Lauper to Celine Dion and Etta James, music's finest are donning their favorite pose to capitalize on consumer sentimentality this holiday season. (Thankfully, Mariah stayed away.)
But between it all, a few original and innovative recordings get made. This year four remarkable gay recordings earn the right to claim your hard-earned cash.
On Glad Tidings We Bring, the 19 year old Windy City Gay Chorus teams up with Unison, a Chicago group of gay and lesbian singers for a delicious and harmonizing 15track collection of yuletime favorites.
Under the masterful eye of Welborn Young, the song cycle swings from the traditional (“Ave Maria" and "Silent Night") to the fun ("Jingle Bells" and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town") to the melancholy ("Still, Still, Still” and “Angel Standing By").
While the group seems to have omitted fare for Jewish celebrators, the set brims with the rousing joyfulness of so many voices joined together. Indeed, glad tidings, this group does bring. If you can't find it in your local store, e-mail the group wcpa@windycitysings.org.
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Similar in tone, but different in structure is the Atlanta Gay Men's Chorus, who mark their debut recording Carols, Revels and Holiday Cheer (DiverseCity Records) with a stirring and brilliantly produced collection of well-known and lesser-known holiday ditties.
The 17 year old, 120-member group, gleefully rise to the occasion with nearly 20 songs that celebrate the various traditions of different world nations, as well as beloved classics from home.
Beginning with “Medieval Gloria," they move through "Riu, Rui Chiu: El Lobo Rabioso" (Spain), “Carol From An Irish Cabin" (Ireland), "Still, Still, Still" (Aus-
tria) and "Bashana Haba'ah" (Israel). And with a "Gloucestershire Wassail," they swiftly move into tradition (“God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen) and camp (“My Favorite Things" from Sound of Music).
This is a joyful must have for fending off the grinch. It's available online at www.diversecity.net.
Not as new, but worth the buck, is Richard Audd's symphonic and synthesized A New Light (RMA). The openly gay Audd's debut opus is as captivating and engaging as it is brilliant. More remarkably, despite the full, rich and bristling sound, it is not a real orchestra performing. Rather, it's a computer-enhanced creation.
Audd arranged all the music. Many of these arrangements were originally written while in college or for an earlier attempt at orchestral simulation on synthesizers. Among the tracks are "Merry Christmas, Mr. Britten" based on Benjamin Britten's "Fugue” from A Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, “Fan-
Klezmer band's latest is a rich journey
by Harriet L. Schwartz Traversing boundaries of time and culture, the Klezmatics continue keeping klezmer Jewish roots music-alive in the 1990s. The band's latest release, The Well (which would make a festive addition to any Chanukah celebration), marks its first collaboration with renowned Israeli singer Chava Alberstein.
The Well opens with the title track, an appropriate prelude to the rest of the album. While the dramatic "I Stand Beneath the Carob Tree" and the more lively "Softly Somewhere/At the River" offer more obvious intensity, most songs on the disc exude a more subtle strength, moving along with more restraint than the most raucous klezmer music.
The Well was produced by Ben Mink, who drew on his own Yiddish roots for the project. Just as the Klezmatics offer a diverse musical résumé, having worked with everyone from Itzhak Perlman to Ben Folds Five, Mink too has produced a variety of artists, including k.d. lang, Roy Orbison, and Barenaked Ladies. The Well is a near perfect coming together of a band, a diva, and a producer for a
rich and emotional musical journey.
While this album is likely to be filed under ethnic or world music, the Klezmatics are familiar to many gay and lesbian listeners. Violinist Alicia Svigals and vocalist Lorin Sklamberg are both openly gay. In addition, the band previously collaborated with Tony Kushner on his adaptation of the classic Yiddish stage play The Dybbuk. ♡
Harriet L. Schwartz is a freelance writer living in Pittsburgh.
The Klezmatics
Bernhard seeks Mr. Right in dark comedy
by Kaizaad Kotwal
Columbus-All of a sudden Sandra Bernhard is ubiquitous. She has a book out, she has a hit show on Broadway and she's in a new movie by Ramin Niami titled Somewhere in the City. Regardless
six central characters are neighbors in the same Lower East Side tenement. These men and women also share an unrelenting loneliness that causes them to seek happiness, success, love and sex in each other's arms and apartments.
The film presents us with a menagerie of men and women from different walks of life and assorted ethnic backgrounds. This is New York, and anything else would be fantasy. Bernhard plays Betty, a selfobsessed therapist desperately seeking Mr. Right. And gay audiences will love Peter Stormare as Graham, a Shakespearean actor who is also seeking Mr.
Robert John Burke and Sandra Bernhard in Somewhere in Right. the City.
of her Energizer Bunny-like persistence, her style, her chutzpah and her in-yourface rambunctiousness are unmitigated and a reminder that this self-identified bisexual woman is multi-talented.
Somewhere in the City is a dark New York comedy inspired by Maxim Gorki's book The Lower Depths. In Niami's film,
Ramin Niami, the film's Iranian-born writer, director and producer, gives us a movie that truthfully portrays the clichés of New York life with refreshing nuances and subtle strokes of celluloid narrative. Somewhere in the City has a very limited run at the Wexner Center for two nights only on December 18 and 19 at 7:00 p.m. each night. Tickets are $5 for
the general public and $4 for Wexner Center members, students and senior citizens. Call 614-292-3535 for tickets and more information.
Featuring
over 450 of Cleveland's
finest artists.
fare, Gesu Bambino," "O Come All Ye Faithful," "Silent Night," "Little Drummer Boy" performed in a bolero-like form, “Glory to God" from Vespers by Rachmaninov, and "Sleigh Ride" by Audd.
Audd's equally impressive and exquisite new album Somewhere Over... contains great songs from motion pictures and Broadway which he recorded to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Stonewall.
This album is completely instrumental, except for some electronic choral moans. It's the ideal stocking stuffer. If you can't find it, you can order it online at http:// www.rmamusic.com/products.htm.
So, as you wrap your Prada and toast in the year ahead, don't get too caught up in the commercial appeal of Etta, Celine and Cyndi. Remember the gayer side of the CD rack and crank up some holiday cheer with panache.
Jeffrey Newman is a Chronicle contributing writer in New York City.
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