Page 16 - Write Away November Issue

HAPPY’S THEATRE REVIEWS OF GREAT PLAYS FOR SONGWRITERS:
George Gershwin Alone and Monsieur Chopin by Heshey Felder
There are a series of plays that Hershey Felder
has done based on the lives of famous
composers. I have seen them all and they are
all amazing and highly recommend. He tours
with these shows so be sure to see them if you
are a songwriter or even if you are not. Here
are my reviews of some of them:
HAPPY’S THEATRE REVIEW: George Gershwin
Alone by Hershey Felder
At The Old Globe Theatre
4 Happy Face (Out of 4 possible)
Going to this play is like going to a workshop
on songwriting technique, as well on what the
life of a songwriter is like. Being a songwriter
himself, the Happy Man found this to be quite
a profound experience. A memorable moment
came right at the beginning, when he laid out
the theory behind one song and said the normal
thing would be to go to certain thing during the
song, but that since he didn’t do the “normal
thing” he did something else. The whole play
was filled with songwriting tidbits like that; I
can’t remember any work of art that delved
more deeply into the art of songwriting and
music since the play and movie Amadeus. I laughing hilariously. And he answered “well
wanted to take notes and ended up buying a
copy of the CD so that I could hear some of the
insights into music again.
When Gershwin talked about his life it was
generally comical material about his
hyper-critical Jewish parents. Perhaps the
most moving part of the play was how he
seemed genuinely confused by why his
girlfriend left him, “she said I didn’t need her
anymore, I have no idea why.”
The entire play was simply the one actor sitting
at and in front of a piano talking about
Gershwin’s life, up to and including his death, as music.”
well as playing and singing many of
Gershwin’s songs. Afterwards the actor broke
character and asked the audience what songs
they would like to hear. He then memorably lead we do”
the audience in the singing of several songs,
expertly feeding us the lines as he went – not
an easy task to teach people a song as they
are singing it. At one point he warned that a
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song was somewhat “inappropriate” and I said
“yeah inappropriate!!!” and the whole audience
laughed, probably the largest crowd to laugh at
something the Happy Man did.
The playwright and actor has two other plays in
this style and will be doing a special one-week
show of one of them, it’s a mark of how much
I enjoyed this that I shall be buying my ticket to
see them.
HAPPY’S THEATRE REVIEW: Monsieur Chopin
By Hershey Felder
at The Old Globe Theatre (and touring)
4 Happy Faces (Out Of 4 possible)
This is one of a series of one-man plays about
different composers by Hershey Felder.
My favorite moment was at the end where he
said we should ask him questions and he would
answer them as Chopin. I asked him “Mr
Chopin, what do you think of Gershwin”, whom
one of Felder’s other one man plays was about.
It took him and the audience a few seconds to
wrap their mind around that and they all started
Gershwin wasn’t around when I was alive, but
Gershwin did say that music should be
performed lightly, not like in the style of Chopin”
Then “Chopin” gets his revenge and sits at the
piano and plays one of Gershwin’s tunes in the
style of Chopin. It was hilarious.
As usual there were lots of great quotes
regarding music that I hurried home to write
down, probably don’t have them exact:
“God gives everyone an appreciation of music.
To be an artist, pray he gives you the energy to
sit at the piano several hours a day and MAKE
“Don’t write music for other people. Write
music because you are an artist. That’s what
“I just sat down and listened for the music I
wanted to hear.” “Practice three hours a day,
no more, otherwise you become an automaton.
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