By Aashiq
Link: https://www.stream.theatre/geners/59/12
Available until: Concerts available most days over six weeks at 5pm, 8pm or both. Only available to watch ‘live’ (though not really live as they’re pre-recorded).
Early in our very first lockdown, which feels like absolute centuries ago, one of the first organisations to start producing work online was Lambert Jackson Productions. They joined up with the West End’s celebrated Theatre Café, who agreed to host Lambert Jackson’s concerts. Lambert Jackson got probably nearly 100 West End stars together (they must have been too shy to ask me) and they each performed a concert in their own home. The concerts were somewhere between 45 minutes and an hour and each performer did up to ten songs, chatting to their fans in between songs, talking about their songs, their lives in lockdown and their careers.
It was a brilliant series and it led to two recent announcements that gets my heart pumping like it does when my husband… actually, you don’t need to know that. First there was the announcement of a new series of Leave the Light On concerts. It was only a very short series this time, but short can be sweet. My husband says I’m both. He usually says it when I’m fussing about my height again. I’ve got him well-trained. But anyway, the second series was great and it was soon followed by another announcement – seventy of the concerts would be re-streamed on Stream Theatre, starting on Monday 15th March.
(I have no idea why the other concerts aren’t being restreamed so don’t ask. I’ll only make something up that probably isn’t true.)
I didn’t see all the concerts first time around. It took me a while to work out how it all worked, but even when I did, there were fifteen concerts a day and I’m a NON-WORKING ACTOR and although the prices were brilliant, they did start to develop a bad habit of adding up. (Don’t you just hate a bit of unprovoked maths in your life?)
But I can tell you that there are some seriously brilliant concerts coming up and if you’re a musical theatre fan, there’s probably someone you’ll want to see. The singers have mostly chosen a mix of musical theatre songs and pop music and they’ve put together really interesting concerts. The chatting they do between songs is great too because it’s an opportunity to learn a bit more about the performers you love. You also get to see inside their homes (we see living rooms, bedrooms, conservatories, kitchens) and some of them have a surprise guest from their bubble who comes and sings with them.
I’m going to have to use my memory now and that’s usually only good when it comes to remembering who I’m in a strop with (no, not really, I do sometimes remember my lines too), but featured musicals include & Juliet, Dear Evan Hansen, Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Kinky Boots, The Phantom of the Opera, Six, Songs for a New World, Waitress and Wicked. I’m afraid I don’t have such a good memory for the non-MT songs, but featured artists include Sara Bareilles, Joni Mitchell, Barbra Streisand and Tina Turner with some singers also performing their own music. There’s also a lot of Disney. If there’s something you’d like to hear that isn’t in that list, I probably forgot to mention it.
Six fans will have the opportunity to see two Catherines of Aragon (Jarneia Richard-Noel and Lauren Drew, who’s done two concerts) two Jane Seymours (Natalie May Paris and Lauren Byrne), two Katherine Howards (Sophie Isaacs and Jodie Steele), and a Catherine Parr (Danielle Steers), along with two swings (Grace Mouat and Vicki Manser).
The many other stars include Sophie Evans, David Hunter (two concerts), Cassidy Janson, Rachel John, Lucie Jones (two concerts), Beverley Knight, John Owen-Jones, Sam Tutty, Rachel Tucker and Layton Williams.
You could also find out the answers to the following questions (some might have more than one answer and you should probably keep in mind that I saw most of these concerts once nearly a year ago so it’s possible I’m getting some confused with other concerts which aren’t being repeated).
Who needed therapy because of the demands of a very difficult song and what musical instrument helped them to overcome their problems? (No disrespect at all to anyone who's in therapy. I'm in therapy myself and so are half the people who know me.)
Whose recording equipment fell over mid-show?
Who treated us to a view of their backside in the opening moments and informed us they ‘don’t usually behave like this’ in their concerts?
Who found singing on the stairs incredibly sweaty?
Whose dog suddenly got up and ran away as soon as they started singing?
Who found that singing in a mask didn’t go quite as planned?
Who needed a wee mid-show?
Who made friends with a fly?
Who took a curtain call with their skirt stuck in their knickers?
Who announced mid-show that they were going to fill in the time by answering ‘questions from fans’ and why was this particularly memorable?
So what are you waiting for? Watch the shows you didn’t
see last time, watch the shows you did see but wished you could see again. Get
on Stream Theatre and book those tickets! (They seriously are great. I’m not
just saying that because I know some of the singers. And their singing’s not
bad either.)
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