THE THEATRE CHANNEL EPISODE 3 (Theatre Café)****

 

By Imogen

Link: The Theatre Channel Episode 3 - The Theatre Cafe

Available until: 27^th November 2021

The Theatre Channel Episode 3 focuses on musicals which are or have at least been described as rock musicals. There is a wide range of different songs which are sung by stars of musical theatre. The biggest star is John Owen-Jones but there are some young cute men in it too.

The episode opens with a performance of Aquarius from Hair by the brilliant Café Four. Sadie-Jean Shirley opens the show like a leading lady. She, Alyn Hawke, Emily Langham and Alex Woodward are a really strong ensemble with voices that blend together really well. I could never be in an ensemble because I am a star but I always appreciate the work ensembles do to support me.

The first soloist is Francesca Jackson who sings Forgiven from a musical called Jagged Little Pill which is based on the album with that name by Alanis Morrisette. Francesca gets the style just right and there’s a lot of darkness and pain in her performance.

One of the best known songs in the concert is Gethsemane from Jesus Christ Superstar. This is sung by Rob Houchen who is a very versatile West End star. His performance is very intense in the rock section and the quieter section.

The Who’s Tommy is usually known as a rock opera rather than a rock musical but I don’t think it’s operatic at all so rock musical seems fair to me. Aisha Jawando sings The Acid Queen. It’s a great performance and I like the use of special effects. All through this concert the organisers have thought about setting with some singers in different indoor venues, some outdoors and some in places that you don’t recognise because of the special effects.

It’s very common to perform operas in foreign languages if that’s the language they were written in but musicals like Les Miserables are usually translated into English before they come to the West End because everyone knows the whole of the UK (except Megan) is really bad at languages. But because I’m used to opera I don’t mind hearing musicals in other languages. I’m happy to sing in foreign languages too as long as no-one actually expects me to speak in them. Alex Gaumond sings Le Monde es Stone from Starmania. I’m not crazy about the song but he has a good rock voice and the lighting is really good.

I think most people who know anything about musical theatre know about Hope Mill Theatre’s online production of Rent and in this concert you get to hear one of the songs from Rent, the reprise to I’ll Cover You. It’s usually sung by a male character (Collins) but here it is sung by Shan Ako who doesn’t look like a man. But it’s a really emotional rendition of the song and the style really suits her. Seriously if you want to get into musical theatre but you don’t actually want to go to drama school, audition for X Factor. Loads of people who reach the finals are now musical theatre stars and they get cast because they’re now official Big Names. And not just that, they are actually good.

John Owen-Jones is famous for singing John Valjean and the Phantom but in this concert he sings a less well-known song, Pity the Child from Chess. It’s a challenging song as he has to belt and bring his voice right down to pianissimo but it all sounds really easy and natural for him and he puts a lot of emotion into the songs. I like the chess board floor too.

That is the last song but after the credits there’s a behind the scenes feature from Luc Plamondon and Alex Gaumond. Some of it is in French which is just showing off but there are subtitles.