Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – Broadway stars working the cabaret circuit: ANDY KARL & ORFEH at Chelsea Table & Stage and MELISSA ERRICO at 54 Below

• By drediman
• August 8, 2022
• No Comments

This past week, I caught a couple of Broadway stars working New York’s cabaret circuit. As always, here are my thoughts.

MELISSA ERRICO WITH BILLY STRITCH: SWING LESSONS
54 Below

On Friday, I had the pleasure of spending an intimate evening with Broadway’s Melissa Errico and her indispensable music director Billy Stritch on the keys (completing the onstage music trio was the wonderful Tom Hubbard on bass) (RECOMMENDED). Although fans best know Ms. Errico for her leading lady duties in such musicals as My Fair Lady and High Society, they may not know that Ms. Errico is also an eager student of jazz. With the great Mr. Stritch (whose own silken version of the bossa nova standard “Medition” was a stunning highlight of the evening) at her side, she produced a set – appropriately entitled Swing Lessons – that pleased both fans of musical theater and jazz, as evidenced by a jazzed-up medley of “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” from the aforementioned My Fair Lady by Lerner and Loewe and “My Favorite Things” from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music. Indeed, Ms. Errico was in fine voice throughout night, crooning songs by the likes of Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Rodgers and Hart, and Stephen Sondheim with agility and swinging caress.

AN EVENING WITH ORFEH & ANDY KARL
Chelsea Table & Stage

Going down a more pop and rock path last Thursday at Chelsea Table & Stage – a relatively new addition to New York’s vibrant cabaret scene – was Broadway power couple Andy Karl and Orfeh (RECOMMENDED). Although most of their fans know them from having appeared together on the Great White Way in Saturday Night Fever (doing which they met), Legally Blonde, and most recently Pretty Woman, the Broadway songbook was nary in sight (only once did they “slip” when Mr. Karl sang “Freedom” from Pretty Woman, and even that song was penned by rocker Bryan Adams). Their agenda for the show was as simple as can be – to let loose and fun, both for themselves, as well as for their adoring audiences. It was refreshing and fun to see these ultimate professionals bask in rock and roll swagger. Of the two, Orfeh was the indisputable star of the evening, stopping the show with the force of her powerful chesty renditions of crowd-pleasing songs like Paula Abdul’s “Straight Up” and Janis Joplin’s “Piece of My Heart”.