Last Thursday, March 12, Jose gave a solo concert at the Lincoln Center as part of the American Songbook series. Our little group (below) arrived very early for the show. We were later joined by Gracita--all the way from Manila via Rotterdam--by Erik’s family and by Jen, Ralph and Rosalie plus many of their friends.
While waiting, we went for a drink in the nearby Lincoln Center’s Beaumont Theater where a revival of The King and I was opening for previews that same night . What an amazing coincidence. Jose had started his Broadway career as Lun Tha in that show (with Lou Diamond Philips and Donna Murphy) at the tender age of eighteen. And twenty years later he was now giving a solo concert at the Lincoln Center that would include two songs from that show. Life goes around in circles sometimes.
We had no trouble finding the theater. The Lincoln Center had thoughtfully set up a series of lighted Jose billboards for us. At a distance, it looked like a runway for incoming planes.
The concert was staged in the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse Theater on the 10th floor of the Julliard School in the Lincoln Center complex. It was set up like a cabaret club. An array of cocktail tables (replete with wine) flanked the stage on three sides. Behind Jose, performing on stage with a five-piece band and three back up singers, were huge windows which looked out over the shimmering skyline of downtown Manhattan. A stunning venue.
According to the Playbill, the Lincoln Center’s American Songbook series has been around since 1998. It celebrates American song in all its different styles--from the early days of Tin Pan Alley and Broadway to Motown, Hip Hop and all the rest--while showcasing emerging concert, cabaret, theater and songwriter performers.
I started looking at some of the American Songbook performers in recent years and found lots of names that I knew: Marianne Faithfull and Chita Rivera (2010); Raul Esparza, Herb Alpert and Mary Chapin Carpenter (2011); Lin-Manuel Miranda and Elaine Paige (2012); Kristin Chenoweth, Joel Grey, Idina Menzel and Karen Akers (2013); and Patina Miller and Rebecca Naomi Jones (2014).
And now Jose was joining their ranks. Impressive.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
Stephen Holden, music critic at the New York Times, says that the American Songbook series began as "a nostalgic program showcasing popular standards by the likes of Iriving Berlin, the Gershwins and Cole Porter...but has since become a progressive, increasingly multicultural program devoted to the new as much as to the old”. More recently, he says, they are "a reflection of the 'real New York City', a place of continual cultural collision and assimilation”.
(See: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/23/arts/american-songbook-series-reshapes-the-canon.html)
Multicultutral? Cultural collision and assimilation? Hmmm. Isn’t that a perfect summary of what Jose’s theater career has been all about? Son of Filipino emigres, trying to break into a very white theater industry, coming out, breaking down all the barriers, playing both Asian and Western roles, assimilating and overcoming. Isn’t that what his concert would celebrate? We would find out soon.
The show was extraordinary. Just coming onto the stage, Jose got a rousing reception from an ardent and hyped-up audience. Even discounting the fact that his family, friends, industry contacts and rabid fans were all there, that still left an awful lot of people who were just regular theater-goers--and they went wild too. There were also lots of family and friends watching the live streaming of the show in Manila, Washington DC and, wait for it, New Zealand.
Jose opened with three songs from Adam Guettel’s Myths and Hymns. Adam Guettel was in the audience, as was the New York Times music critic, Stephen Holden, who wrote:
“Three songs from that production--“Saturn Returns,” “Icarus” and “Hero and Leander” were the high points of a concert whose twin themes were aspiration and freedom, scrutinized from the perspective of a gay immigrant from Southeast Asia whose American dreams have come true”. Holden also said of Jose: “Two decades after that production, he still finds more truths in those lyrics than any other singer I’ve heard". Praise indeed.
Jose told many stories that linked and explained some 17 songs in all. Some stories were funny (he sang “we spiss in the shadow” on his first nervous night of The King and I). Some were sad (he could not be his happy, gay self during his singing and recording debut in the Philippines). But the most poignant and moving story of the night was when he explained how his role in Here Lies Love had given him a full understanding of what his parents had had to sacrifice in leaving the Philippines under the shadow of Marcos and a brutal martial law environment.
For me, there were many high points. The moment when he said Patricia was his hero. The beautiful lullaby (Billy Joel’s “Lullaby (Goodnight, My Angel)" which he would hum to Veronica and Max at bedtime. (She went all shy when he mentioned her name). “I Have Dreamed” which he sang at our wedding. The beautiful song that he dedicated to Erik. The hilarious “My Unfortunate Erection” from The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. And the the ravishing song ("Kailangan Kita”) that he sang in Tagalog from his concerts and the CD he recorded in the Philippines.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
Most of all, I just loved the power and emotion that he brought to the two songs from Here Lies Love. The first one, he never got to sing at the Public Theater because it was Aquino’s “Child of the Philippines”. It is a great song. In auditioning for that show, he told us that he thought he was auditioning for the Aquino role and was quite taken aback when he was told that he was to be Ferdinand Marcos. Isn’t he the bad guy?
But I think Marcos was a far more difficult role to play. He had to capture the cynicism, duplicity and seductiveness of Marcos. All three seemed to run in parallel. Jose played it to the hilt when he sang “A Perfect Hand” with the wonderful Jaygee Macapugay who had so perfectly played the flawed and, ultimately, delusional Imelda Marcos in Here Lies Love. His Mum and Dad in the audience must have have been so proud that they had risked everything to bring Patricia and Jose to America.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
The cabaret setting was perfect for Jose’s concert. He could almost reach out and touch you. His voice was so sweet and soothing when it needed to be; and then he would blow you out of your chair with some rock anthem! The songs he sang demonstrated his enormous range and also outlined his incredible journey in theater from Lun Tha all the way to Ferdinand Marcos--and, in between, playing such divergent roles as Guillaume in Martin Guerre, Ta in Flower Drum Song, Angel in Rent, the frantic singing/dancing Jessie-Lee in Street Corner Symphony and the nasty, snarling, psychopathic Bill Sikes in Oliver! Talk about range.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
It must be nice to be able to trace your whole career through song. Not only does it help you easily remember what you have done but it entertains everyone else into the bargain. Hearing all those songs also brought back many happy memories of earlier days in New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Manila, Minneapolis, Washington DC and wherever else we went to see his shows.
The cabaret atmosphere and our proximity to the stage also allowed us to get close to the band and the back up singers who were such an integral and unifying part of the whole production. Jose told us that he had to keep his fingers crossed and just hoped that he could bring in Kimberly Grigsby (below) as musical director and piano.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
With shows like Here Lies Love, Spider-Man, Light in the Piazza, The Full Monty and literally dozens of other musical director credits to her name, I think Jose should have had his eyes and legs crossed too. But, thankfully, she came; and so did a truly wonderful group of players: Jack Bashkow on sax, Simon Kafka on guitar, Pete Donovan on bass, and Kevin Garcia on drums. Each of Kimberly, Jack, Simon, Pete and Kevin should have a concert of their very own. They were superb. I even got to meet some of them at the party at Tavern on the Green afterwards. They are stars in their own right.
Photo courtesy Lia Chang
In rehearsal mode
Jose was also so lucky to have his Here Lies Love cast members Jaygee Macapugay, Jeigh Madjus and Enrico Rodriguez (below) as his back up singers. It was like getting a re-run of that magnificent show and you could tell just how “close" everyone on stage was. I know nothing about music but they were one smooth machine on stage and I guess that is the ultimate “oneness" and harmony that every singer, band and back up group hope to achieve. We were already on the 10th floor but these guys were soaring even higher.
Photo courtesy Kevin Yatarola--Lincoln Center's Facebook
Here Lies Love cast members regroup for Jose’s concert
And when you have so many songs, so many voices and so many instruments you need orchestrators. Jose told us that he was very proud (not to mention very relieved) to have Matt Stine (also from Here Lies Love) and Cody Owen Stine (of Eager to Lose and Murder Ballad fame) to help put all the music (charts?) together for each of the singers and instruments. I can’t do the math but think of 17 x however many singers and instruments there are--the number is off the charts!
The front cover of the Playbill for the March 2015 American Songbook promised “Outstanding Artists, Intimate Settings and Unforgettable Evenings”. The artists were beyond outstanding, the setting was indeed intimate and the evening was truly unforgettable. Truth in Advertising.
Here are a few photos I took after the show. (No photos during the show, please). We forgot our camera so these are just cell phone photos. Can you believe that our tickets included an after-show party at the Tavern on the Green? The night just got better. Sorry I don’t have any photos of the many other people at the after-party. But thanks to Lia Chang for a few of them below. I think I was too busy trying to figure out how to get the tickets for the drinks at the bar....
Proud Family after the Concert
A big hug for Veronica from Ninong at Tavern on the Green
Photo courtesy Lia Chang
Gracita and Regee were so excited to meet David Byrne!
Jose with Erik and his family
Photo courtesy Lia Chang
The Joel Family and their friends with Jose
Photo courtesy Lia Chang
Photo courtesy Lia Chang
Adrian, Patricia and Kathy settling in for a long night
Veronica conked out after the show! But she loved every minute of it--including part of the Tavern on the Green party. Veronica has also seen Here Lies Love. What a little trooper.
Max was still a bit young for the concert but watched TV with his babysitter at Jose and Erik’s apartment. Maybe he was watching the show on the live streaming from the Lincoln Center? He will tell us when he is 8 years old.
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