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| The Doo-Wop Project, featuring the Motortown Band The Town Hall Friday, September 13th 8 PM Now this is a great idea! In the aftermath of the long-running, Tony-winning Jersey Boys, all of a sudden, there's an abundance of talented, trained Broadway-centric singers out there who are suddenly well-versed in the elusive intricacies of that much-abused musical form known as doo-wop. First, you start with quintet of former Jersey Boys cast members - from the myriad of productions, the original Broadway cast and replacements, the road companies and regional productions, what have you. Then, you build what amounts to a "jukebox musical" but without the musical theater part. (And thus, thankfully, without dialog like "It used to be about the music, man!") In other words, you just have the actual music being performed by an inspired group of young tenors, baritones and bassos, who take the best hits of the 1950s and the doo-wop era (which really reaches a climax and all-time apogee with Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons) and sing the heck out of it. (The heck, I say!) The Doo Wop project, backed by the Motortown Band, does for the best pop music of the era - especially the Imperials, the Penguins, the Flamingos (and other ornithological ensembles) roughly what the Fab Faux does for The Beatles, meaning that they don't treat it like a nostalgia act, or a wedding / cover band, they sing it as if it was music - and quintessential American pop music at that. By Will Friedwald write your comments about the article :: © 2019 Jazz News :: home page |