The Kennedy Center
Just did my debut at the Kennedy Center in the intimate and handsome Family Theater. I was gratified to see the place almost full. I was the first concert in the series (curated by the remarkable Renée Fleming), and, perhaps, the farthest out of the five (Billy Childs, Jane Monheit, Leslie Odom Jr., Alan Cumming, and me). So I felt I needed to usher the audience into my world with care. Started off with my classical male alto at its most medieval, headed into something operatic but on a folk-like melody, then picked up a foot-long section of galvanized pipe and started blowing a rhythmic riff, and singing my version of the old spiritual Gospel Plough.
We were far afield now, so I brought them home again with a new arrangement of Black is the Color with a synth accompaniment, and a French melodie from 1913 by Reynaldo Hahn on a poem by Théophile de Viau, singing and doing my best impression of an accompanist at the same time. I followed that with a somewhat skewed (and, I think, touching) arrangement of Nun Danket Alle Gott. Then I turned to the guitars and ukuleles. The audience seemed up for the adventure, so we just sailed along after that, moving from genre to genre and instrument to instrument until my hour and a half was up. Ended with a thing called Prayer, a kind of piano chorale under a falsetto melody. Here are the words:
When out of ignorance we forget how alike we are
Have mercy, have mercy upon us
When out of greed we forget to care for one another
Have mercy, have, mercy upon us
When out of fear we forget what makes us human
Have mercy , have mercy upon us
Let us pray for a day when we may understand
Let us pray for a day when we may be a wiser people
