4th Annual Sydney Cabaret Convention
Second Night - Wednesday, June 28, 2000
Sydney Town Hall: Sydney, Australia

After yesterday's experience at the Convention I was more than a little concerned. Was I being too critical of the performances? Too demanding? Was I overlooking the treasures being offered by these performers? It was time to clear my mind and go back to basics.

As luck would have it, I stumbled onto an article I had picked up and filed away for future pleasure. It was a reprint of something written by Andrea Marcovicci, one of the true divas of cabaret, in which she tried to define what this unique experience means to her and what must happen to bring it to life for others in the audience. For her, cabaret "has come to mean an intensely personal evening of song and stories, delivered in a simple, honest way, in an intimate space that shatters the 'fourth wall,' a term actors use to describe what's beyond the footlights .... But the real art of the cabaret performer lies in the juxtaposition of songs, putting two or three songs together in such a way that new and deeper meanings come to light, the resonance of one song lingering to change the color of the next .... it can dazzle you, catch you unawares and make you weep. It is not television. The audience participates in a direct, emotional conversation with the artist and leaves feeling contacted and personally touched ... As my friend and colleague David Staller says, it's the natural descendant of storytelling around the fire ... "

Was this what was happening last night or this evening? I decided to look again at my notes and try to revisit the first evening. What had moved me about the young performers I mentioned? Trevor Ashley's singing of "Quiet Love" was a real-life moment when one person must use sign language to "speak" to a hearing-impaired loved one. There was a truth and poignancy in this moment and that is what made it special for me. In Andrew Threlfall and Cassie Stafford's songs, they were singing about the life situations an adolescent knows all too well: difficulty of meeting someone ("Shy" by Mary Rodgers and Marshall Barer from ONCE UPON A MATTRESS), anxiety prior to a first date ("Tonight At Eight" by Bock and Harnick from SHE LOVES ME), the anger of relationship breakdown ("Goodbye Emile" by and Hermann from ROMANCE, ROMANCE) and the sadness that comes at the end of an affair ("Good Thing Going" by Sondheim from MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG), all of which these two young performers seemed to understand and relate to. There was a truth in their performances, raw though they were, that bridged the distance between them and us, out there in the darkness. Many of the other artists (a rock singer who could not be understood, a country and Western singer doing covers of her idol, a cloned nightclub act with impersonations that was already out of date in the 60's, an act extolling masturbation) were performing "acts" to entertain, not to move or touch us.

It seemed like a good time to revisit my list of "Pitfalls to be avoided" by cabaret performers that I had developed last year. Were my concerns still valid, particularly after reading Andrea Marcovicci's thoughts? Let me review them again:

Pitfall One: Avoid using material from a show currently or recently in production because what works over the space of an hour or more is not easily excerpted to make a statement about the performer in seven minutes. No matter how good that material is, it must be entirely re-conceived to work or it will seem like "bleeding chunks" from another show.

Pitfall Two: Don't work with canned music because it tends to limit your ability to "work the moment" and leaves the audience feeling as if they are watching a living video clip.

Pitfall Three: If you are a belter, find a way to show the audience that you have "heart." Perhaps this is more a personal preference than a practical rule. I found myself admiring a number of the BIG VOICES, but seemed to lose interest in the person behind the sound if there was no human content. Cabaret is, after all, about engaging the audience in your "slice of life." Loud often seems cold: it is hard for me to feel engagement with such a person and take to heart what he or she is telling me about life.

Pitfall Four: This follows from #3 above. Contrast is a large part of this art. That is not to say that "big sound equals small returns." No, what I mean is that it is quite difficult to move from loudly extrovert to quietly sincere or vice versa without making the shift of gears too obvious.

Yes, on reflection, particularly after last night and this evening, these are still difficulties encountered by the young artists on view. But the list was not exhaustive. There were a few more items to add to the list:

Pitfall Five: Don't close you eyes when performing. Cabaret is about telling your story to us, not talking to yourself. When singers close their eyes, they seem to be denying us some opportunity to share in the emotion of the moment.

Pitfall Six: Don't impersonate someone else when performing. Playing a role means wearing a mask, thereby avoiding genuine contact with the audience. Performing in cabaret is about allowing yourself to be vulnerable and dealing as honestly as possible with real-life truths. To "perform" a role is to create separateness, not communion.

How well did tonight's performers deal with the business of creating cabaret? Of the 11 acts on offer, there were a six artists who offered beautiful, and sometimes quite imaginative moments. Let me single out some of these performances and highlight some of the pitfalls these artists might avoid in the future.

Two performers (Leslie Avrill and Gina Zoia) appeared to take refuge behind the mask of a character in order "sell" their material (Pitfall 6). Leslie Avrill seemed to feel as if she needed to act drunk to sing her first blues about a lonely woman, but then had difficulty switching gears for the second and far more extroverted number. Gina Zoia made the mistake of attempting comedy material (in the role of a Catholic girl in church who experiences a conversion to pop music in the middle of Mass) that was too complicated to set up in the brief time allotted to her. However, she finished with a beautifully winning performance of Arlen and Harburg's "If I Only Had A Brain" from WIZARD OF OZ. Had she found a way to pair this utterance with something less outlandish and more personal than the comedy routine, her performance would have been more successful. Role playing in the case of both performers only served to distance them from the audience and made it quite difficult for them to move out of role to sing their second song. In Ms. Zoia's case, her move from a zany extroverted character to her quiet statement in the Arlen song was an unfortunate example of Pitfall 4, as well.

Another performer, Peter Bodner, opened well with a gentle and winning song about tolerance and acceptance of diversity called "John and Fred" (by Dale Gonyea from THE GAY 90'S) that epitomized the best in story-telling. He was clearly dealing with material that was heartfelt and connected easily with his audience. His decision to move from this very honest moment to one of overwrought emotion, Sondheim's "Being Alive" (from COMPANY), was less than ideal. He seemed more intent on showing off, with his voice at full volume in its top range, than on exploring the text of this beautiful song (Pitfall 3). As a consequence , I lost touch with the humanity of his first song and his genuineness as a performer.

Two acts provided entertainment, but could not be considered cabaret as described by Marcovicci: Company 4 and Janet Seidel. Company 4 (a group comprising Carla de Jong, Kate Early, David Keene and Hayden Tee) met while taking part in the new Singer, Actor, Dancer course being taught at the National Institute of Dramatic Art. Though their act was somewhat derivative ("Money Makes The World Go Around" from CABARET by Kander and Ebb and "Cantata For A First Date" by Jimmy Roberts and Joe DiPietro from I LOVE YOU, YOU'RE PERFECT, NOW CHANGE), it demonstrated an effervescence and youthful charm that was winning entertainment, if not necessarily cabaret. Though the group was dealing with some material that could be construed as personal (the dating ritual of the second song), they were too busy performing to make this a personal statement (Pitfall 6). In addition, the transition between songs was virtually non-existent, perhaps indicating that these are two parts of a larger act (Pitfall 1).

Janet Seidel, performer in some of Sydney's finest hotels and veteran of several cabaret conventions, performed a beautiful set of songs associated with the career of Doris Day and made this material seem charming and unhackneyed. Though this was an excerpt from her show DORIS AND ME, Ms. Seidel managed to convince us that this performance could stand alone. Though she did not set out to say very much about the human condition, Janet Seidel's smooth delivery, combined with the tart irony of her script, made for good listening. In this case she had clearly avoided the problems associated with performing part of another show by creating something entirely new. Perhaps others could take note of her ability to do this.

Finally, there was one young artist who impressed me and others with the quality of his work this evening: Shaun Rennie. Though his set of songs ("Everybody Wants To Be Sondheim" by Alan Chapman and "Santa Fe" from NEWSIES by Alan Menken and Jack Feldman) was not particularly coherent as a personal statement, his honesty in performance and ability to reach out, particularly in "Santa Fe" (an anthem of adolescent yearning for escape from a painful family situation), set this young man apart from many of his fellow performers this evening. This performer is clearly someone to look out for in the future.

Tonight's special guest artist was Jackie Love. Born in Perth, on the west coast of the continent, Jackie moved to Sydney in 1981 and quickly attained recognition as a singer/dancer. Within a year, she was the supporting act for Sammy Davis Jr. in his national Hilton Hotel tour here. Sammy Davis Jr. was so impressed with Jackie's work that he engaged her to perform with him at Harrah's Hotel in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Jackie has also starred here in JERRY'S GIRLS and HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING and continues to perform on the corporate circuit with her own show, JACKIE LOVE IN CONCERT.

To open her set, Love performed "O Father of Mine" by Siobhan Cruise, a song from ANCIENT EYES, the second of her projected trilogy of CD's featuring the work of this Irish-born songwriter. The performance was simple and direct, a welcome change from much that went before during the showcase. Ms. Love followed this with a medley of some of the "usual suspect" songs associated with Edith Piaf ("La Vie en Rose," "Milord," "Je Ne Regrette Rien"). Quite aside from the fact that Piaf medleys have been "done to death" and should be declared out of musical bounds, I would have preferred to see this artist perform more intimate music to demonstrate her cabaret "chops" for the younger, less experienced colleagues in the house. Tomorrow night, I would be hearing Combo Fiasco and get my first opportunity to hear the group with Charmaine Clements who joined last year. Expectations are high.

And so ended the second night of the convention. Yes, there was more to "write home about." Perhaps my thesis concerning the difference between Australian and American cabaret is not so true this year. Most of the performers seem to have some glimmer of an idea about the nature of cabaret. What lets these artists down, more often than not, is their choice of material. As Andrea Marcovicci said, " ... the real art of the cabaret performer lies in the juxtaposition of songs, putting two or three songs together in such a way that new and deeper meaning come to light..." How would tomorrow's group of performers deal with this critical task?

David M Schwartz

Day Three of the 2000 Sydney Cabaret Convention

Daily Reports on the 2000 Sydney Cabaret Convention

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