Auckland Live and Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra’s cabaret salute to Stephen Sondheim was a sparkling success, complete with a glittering mirror ball over the Civic stage.
This man was a music theatre giant, writing with literary and musical layerings that made his a unique and often challenging voice.
The APO’s selection of numbers, taking advantage of music director Mark W. Dorrell’s close association with Sondheim, shrewdly mixed the familiar with the less so.
Could one imagine a niftier launch than Instructions to the Audience from The Frogs? Or a more moving encore than the full company reprising Send in the Clowns against Dorrell’s gleaming piano?
Tyran Parke was a winning MC, perfectly balancing information, commentary and anecdote, sneaking in a confession of his boyhood idolisation of fellow cast member Delia Hannah.
