LARGE PRINT PROGRAM
LINCOLN CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS
FREDERICK P. ROSE HALL
HOME OF JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER
THE ALLEN ROOM
Lincoln Center presents
American Songbook
January 22–June 12, 2014
Sponsored by Prudential Investment Management
Tuesday Evening, January 28, 2014, at 7:30 and 9:30
James Naughton:
The Songs of Randy Newman
John Oddo, Musical Director, Arranger, and Piano
Nate Brown, Guitar
Jay Leonhart, Bass
Dave Pietro, Tenor and Soprano Saxophones, Clarinet, and
Piccolo
Dave Ratajczak, Drums
This evening’s program is approximately 75 minutes long and
will be performed without intermission.
PLEASE TURN PAGES QUIETLY
(program continued)
2
These performances are being recorded by Live From Lincoln
Center for future broadcast; cameras will be present.
Major support for Lincoln Center’s American Songbook is
provided by Fisher Brothers, In Memory of Richard L. Fisher; and
Amy & Joseph Perella.
Wine generously donated by William Hill Estate Winery,
Official Wine of Lincoln Center.
These performances are made possible in part by the
Josie Robertson Fund for Lincoln Center.
Steinway Piano
Please make certain your cellular phone, pager, or watch
alarm is switched off.
Additional support for Lincoln Center’s American Songbook is
provided by The Brown Foundation, Inc., of Houston, The
DuBose and Dorothy Heyward Memorial Fund, The Shubert
Foundation, Jill and Irwin Cohen, The G & A Foundation, Inc.,
Great Performers Circle, Chairman’s Council, and Friends of
Lincoln Center.
Endowment support is provided by Bank of America.
Public support is provided by the New York State Council on
the Arts.
3
Artist catering is provided by Zabar’s and Zabars.com.
MetLife is the National Sponsor of Lincoln Center, Inc.
Movado is an Official Sponsor of Lincoln Center, Inc.
United Airlines is the Official Airline of Lincoln Center.
WABC-TV is the Official Broadcast Partner of Lincoln Center, Inc.
William Hill Estate Winery is the Official Wine of Lincoln Center.
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc., is pleased to
announce that this evening’s performance will be telecast on PBS
as part of the series Live From Lincoln Center, which is made possible by a major grant from MetLife. Support for Live From Lincoln
Center is provided by the Robert Wood Johnson 1962 Charitable
Trust, Thomas H. Lee and Ann Tenenbaum, The Robert and
Renée Belfer Family Foundation, and Mercedes T. Bass.
This program is scheduled to air on PBS on Friday, April 4 at
9 p.m. (check local listings).
4
Lincoln Center’s Large Print and Braille programs are
made possible thanks to a generous endowment established
by Frederick P. Rose, Daniel Rose, and Elihu Rose in honor
of their mother, Belle B. Rose.
Upcoming American Songbook Events
in The Allen Room:
Wednesday Evening, January 29, at 8:30
Lawrence Brownlee: Spiritual Sketches
Thursday Evening, January 30, at 8:30
Jason Isbell* (limited availability)
Friday Evening, January 31, at 7:30 and 9:30
Patina Miller*
Saturday Evening, February 1, at 8:30
Heartbreak Country: Michael John LaChiusa’s Stories of
America with Kate Baldwin, Sherry D. Boone, Marc Kudisch,
Bryce Ryness, Andrew Samonsky, Emily Skinner,
& Mary Testa
Wednesday Evening, February 12, at 8:30
Sarah Jarosz & The Milk Carton Kids (limited availability)
Thursday Evening, February 13, at 8:30
The Songs of Henry Krieger
with Erin Davie, Charity Dawson, Darius de Haas, Joshua
Henry, Matthew Hydzik, Rebecca Luker, Emily Padgett, Alice
Ripley, Keala Settle, & Lillias White
Friday Evening, February 14, at 8:30
Beth Orton
Saturday Evening, February 15, at 7:30 and 9:30
Jonathan Groff
*These programs will be recorded by Live From Lincoln
Center for future broadcast. Cameras will be present.
The Allen Room is located in Jazz at Lincoln Center’s
Frederick P. Rose Hall.
For tickets, call (212) 721-6500 or visit
AmericanSongbook.org. Call the Lincoln Center Info Request
Line at (212) 875-5766 or visit AmericanSongbook.org for
complete program information.
Join the conversation: #LCSongbook
We would like to remind you that the sound of coughing and
rustling paper might distract the performers and your fellow
audience members.
5
6
In consideration of the performing artists and members of the
audience, those who must leave before the end of the
performance are asked to do so between pieces. The taking of
photographs and the use of recording equipment are not allowed
in the building.
Cartoon Toys and Good Ol’ Boys
by Keith Phipps
When Randy Newman began releasing and recording albums
of his own music in the late 1960s and early ’70s, he did so as an
artist straddling two eras: one dominated by professional
songwriters penning hits for others, and one in which singersongwriters turned their attention to creating confessional albums.
Newman thrived in both eras without really fitting into either.
Newman began his professional career at the age of 17 (in
1961), turning out compositions recorded by a diverse array of
artists, including Irma Thomas, Gene Pitney, Jackie DeShannon,
and, somewhat inexplicably, Wink Martindale. But almost from the
start, Newman made his distinctive gifts apparent. Even in an era
of hits by songwriting duos like Burt Bacharach and Hal David
and Gerry Goffin and Carole King, the opening lines of “I Don’t
Want to Hear It Anymore,” the first of Newman’s two contributions
to Dusty Springfield’s classic 1969 album Dusty in Memphis, have
an arresting “Who wrote that?” quality:
In my neighborhood
we don’t live so good;
the rooms are small
and the buildings made of wood.
7
With a few words, Newman creates a fully formed scene, one
in which poverty and a lack of privacy conspire to amplify
everyday heartbreak.
Newman didn’t tailor his craft to other artists so much as lure
them into his own way of doing things, a mien rooted in decadesold traditions and filled with subtle bits of barbed wit. After
stepping away from the Animals, singer Alan Price was so taken
with Newman’s work that he recorded seven of Newman’s songs
for the 1967 album A Price on His Head. Price’s version of
Newman’s “Simon Smith and His Amazing Dancing Bear” turned
a song about a boy and his bear that could have been a leftover
from Tin Pan Alley into a UK hit at the height of psychedelia.
Listen carefully beneath the charming veneer, and there’s a hint
of the con artist to the song’s protagonist: “Who needs
money/when you’re funny?” Certainly not someone who knows
how to charm it away from others.
As the ’60s turned into the ’70s, the era of the singersongwriter bloomed and Newman too adapted to the changes in
the industry, recording and releasing his eponymous 1968 debut.
Spare recordings of original songs by those who wrote them
became the norm rather than the exception, even when those
8
who wrote them sang with Newman’s distinctive, unvarnished
voice. But Newman was never one to work in a confessional
mode, like James Taylor or Jackson Browne. Nor could he make
the songs written for others sound like pages from his own diary
like King, another artist from an earlier age who learned to adjust.
No matter how closely you listen to a Randy Newman album, you
most often won’t hear Newman himself there, at least not as the
protagonist of his songs.
Newman’s 1970 masterpiece 12 Songs features narrators as
diverse as a man befuddled by the riotous haze of a
contemporary party (“Mama Told Me Not to Come”) to a turnedon arsonist (“Let’s Burn Down the Cornfield”), to a Kentuckian
offering a warts-and-all tribute to his home state that shares only
a title with a Stephen Foster standard (“Old Kentucky Home”). It’s
a wry, witty album but also a lonely one, filled with desperate,
dangerous, fully realized and unnervingly familiar characters. The
songs are evidence of Newman’s sensibility—mordant,
unsparing, yet often tender and humane even in his
disappointment. With 12 Songs, Newman set a pattern he’d
follow on his subsequent albums, including Sail Away and Good
Old Boys.
The former opens with a slaver offering a sales pitch praising
the abundance of America that’s as seductive as it is damning.
His “Lonely at the Top” finds a success story lamenting the
awfulness of having it all while sneering at the little people that
made it possible. (Newman offered the song to Frank Sinatra and
Barbra Streisand. Both declined.) Yet the album’s not all sharp
edges. “He Gives Us All His Love” offers a prayer to a much
different God than the dismissive deity of “God’s Song (That’s
Why I Love Mankind),” and “Dayton Ohio—1903” is a wistful,
vintage postcard of a song, filled with the comforts of the
irretrievable past. With Good Old Boys Newman took his mix of
empathy and unsparing observation to its extreme, starting with
“Rednecks,” the opening track that uses a monologue from a
Southern racist—forbidden epithets and all—to critique Yankee
hypocrisy. From there flows an album filled with drunken
confessions and Southern history, much of it drawn from a
childhood spent in New Orleans. It’s the sort of masterpiece that
leaves an artist with little left to prove.
9
Yet Newman rolled on. Little Criminals (1977) brought him his
biggest hit, “Short People,” attracting controversy from those who
took it at face value. That same misguided expectation of
sincerity allowed him to give Los Angeles its own anthem in 1983
with “I Love L.A.,” a song embraced by those who didn’t take time
to note its lines about nauseated bums (to say nothing of its
cheerful dumbness). By then Newman had begun dividing his
time between albums and film work, crafting the periodappropriate score to Ragtime and the soaring music of The
Natural, among others. (In some ways, it felt inevitable: born into
a musical family, Newman had three uncles in the film score
business and a contemporary in his cousin Thomas Newman.)
Newman’s most lasting film collaboration would begin in 1995
with Toy Story. With “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” and subsequent
10
work on other Pixar films, he started to win a new generation of
fans and admiration, garnering his first Oscar for “If I Didn’t Have
You” from Monsters, Inc. And so the writer of some of the most
biting songs of the past few decades became a beloved icon of
children’s music.
But that’s not the end of the story. Newman continues to turn
out excellent albums, including 1999’s Bad Love and 2008’s Harps
and Angels, that stand proudly beside his classic work, filled with
songs defined by sharp edges and soft hearts. Meanwhile, his
composing work for television and film studios allowed him to
return to his songwriter-for-hire roots, a reminder that it’s part of
the American songwriting tradition to take a small, specific
assignment—say, the lament of a rag-doll cowgirl—and make it
universal, as with “When She Loved Me,” a song whose title alone
can bring tears to the eyes. It may not always be Randy Newman
at the center of his songs, even when he’s the one doing the
singing. But whether writing for lonely cartoon toys or a bitter good
ol’ boy who can’t handle his way of life disappearing, Newman is
in there: always keeping us honest, exploring the lies we tell
ourselves, and ever ready to break our hearts.
Keith Phipps is the editorial director of the film website The
Dissolve (thedissolve.com).
—Copyright © 2014 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc.
Meet the Artists
11
James Naughton
From Broadway and regional theater to television and films,
James Naughton has won critical acclaim in dramas, comedies,
and musicals. Mr. Naughton co-starred opposite Barbara Hershey
in the independent film Childless and appeared in the Weinstein
Company’s Factory Girl as Sienna Miller’s father and in Warner
Independent Pictures’s Suburban Girl alongside Sarah Michelle
Gellar and Alec Baldwin. He appeared opposite Meryl Streep in
The Devil Wears Prada.
No stranger to the stage, Mr. Naughton has won two Tony
Awards for Best Actor in a Musical for Chicago and City of Angels,
the latter of which earned him a Drama Desk Award as well. He
starred in the Broadway production of Democracy as Willy Brandt
opposite Richard Thomas. Mr. Naughton’s other theater credits
include Four Baboons Adoring the Sun, I Love My Wife, Whose
Life Is It Anyway?, Drinks Before Dinner, and Losing Time.
On Broadway, Mr. Naughton directed the Tony-nominated
production of Arthur Miller’s The Price, and he directed Thornton
Wilder’s Our Town starring Paul Newman, which was aired by
PBS’s Masterpiece Theatre. He won the 1999 MAC Award for Best
Male Vocalist for his one-man concert show, Street of Dreams,
presented by Mike Nichols. Mr. Naughton recorded the CD It’s
12
About Time for DRG Records. He also directed the world premiere
of David Epstein’s Surface to Air at Symphony Space in 2007.
Mr. Naughton is currently appearing in the CBS drama
Hostages. His other television credits include guest appearances
on Out of Practice, Travelin’ Man, Bunker, The Birds II: Land’s
End, and Cagney & Lacey: The Return, as well as recurring roles
on Who’s the Boss?, Ally McBeal, Damages, and Gossip Girl. His
other film work includes The Good Mother, The Glass Menagerie,
The Paper Chase, First Kid, A Stranger Is Watching, Second
Wind, and Labor Pains.
John Oddo
John Oddo (musical director and piano) is a musician with
tremendous versatility, as comfortable conducting and arranging for
a jazz trio as for a symphony orchestra. He began his career
working with Woody Herman and his legendary Thundering Herd.
In 1983, Mr. Oddo met Rosemary Clooney and remained at her
side for more than 18 years as musical director, pianist, and
arranger. His credits include work on 20 of Clooney’s recordings as
well as countless live performances and television appearances.
Mr. Oddo has been working with James Naughton since 1996
as musical director, appearing in venues around the country with
a small combo as well as with symphony orchestras. He
produced and arranged Naughton’s first solo CD, It’s About Time.
Mr. Oddo also currently works as musical director for Debby
13
Boone, Christine Ebersole, and Melissa Errico. He has long time
been a frequent collaborator of Michael Feinstein’s, serving as
musical director for many of Feinstein’s shows at Loews Regency
as well as writing many symphony orchestra and big band
arrangements for his tours. Mr. Oddo received a Drama Desk
Award nomination for his orchestrations for Feinstein and Dame
Edna Everage’s 2010 Broadway show, All About Me. Other
collaborators have included Tony Bennett, Ray Charles, Barbara
Cook, Stan Getz, Bob and Dolores Hope, Cheyenne Jackson,
Maureen McGovern, David Hyde Pierce, John Pizzarelli, Toni
Tennille, and Linda Ronstadt.
Mr. Oddo contributed arrangements for Tom Wopat’s latest CD
as well as Steve Tyrell’s latest recording project, and he wrote
arrangements, conducted, and played piano for Don Shelton’s
first solo CD, Hear at Last. He produced and wrote the
arrangements for Swing This, Debby Boone’s latest CD.
Other favorite projects include composing and performing the
theme music for Our Town starring Paul Newman (Masterpiece
Theatre and Showtime) and serving as conductor, pianist, and
arranger for the NBC television special Scott Hamilton and
Friends. Mr. Oddo holds a master’s degree in jazz studies from
the Eastman School of Music.
14
Nate Brown
Nate Brown (guitar) has performed on stages in all 50 U.S.
states and abroad. He has been featured in national tours, has
performed as a leader of his own group, and has served as a
member of jazz ensembles, orchestras, chamber groups, and
club bands. Mr. Brown held the guitar chair for the Broadway
production of Mary Poppins for its six-year run in New York, and
he has recorded for film, television, and several other Broadway
shows. For more information, please visit natebrown.org.
Jay Leonhart
A superior bassist, Jay Leonhart (bass) has also had a parallel
and sometimes overlapping career as a lyricist and occasional
singer. As a child he attended the Peabody Conservatory, and by
the time he attended Boston’s Berklee College of Music he was a
jazz musician. He played with Buddy Morrow and Mike Longo
and became a busy freelance musician in New York. Among Mr.
Leonhart’s many associations are Marian McPartland (with whom
he recorded in 1971), Jim Hall, Urbie Green, Chuck Wayne, Phil
Woods, Gerry Mulligan, Lee Konitz, Don Sebesky, Louie Bellson,
and pianist Mike Renzi. Mr. Leonhart became well known as a
lyricist in the 1980s, when he began leading his own recording
sessions and his songs were recorded by other singers. As a
leader, Mr. Leonhart has recorded for DMP, Sunnyside, Nesak,
and DRG.
Dave Pietro
15
A native of Southboro, Massachusetts, Dave Pietro
(woodwinds) has been on the New York music scene since 1987.
His talents as a gifted saxophonist, composer, and educator have
made him an in-demand musician who has performed at jazz
clubs, jazz festivals, schools, and concert halls in more than 30
countries throughout Asia, Australia, Europe, and North and
South America.
From 1994–2003 Mr. Pietro played lead alto saxophone with
the Toshiko Akiyoshi Jazz Orchestra. He has toured and/or
recorded with the bands of Woody Herman, Lionel Hampton,
Maynard Ferguson, Maria Schneider, John Fedchock, Mike
Holober, Anita Brown, Pete McGuinness, Jim Widner, and Arturo
O’Farrill. He has also performed with Paul Anka, Louie Bellson,
Blood Sweat and Tears, Bobby Caldwell, Ray Charles, Rosemary
Clooney, Harry Connick Jr., Michael Feinstein, Chaka Khan, Liza
Minnelli, James Naughton, and John Pizzarelli. Mr. Pietro studies
East Indian music and has performed with tabla player Sandip
Burman. As a leader, he has released six CDs with musicians
such as Dave Holland, Kenny Werner, Ben Monder, Bill Stewart,
Brian Blade, Scott Colley, Scott Wendholt, Duduka Da Fonseca,
Helio Alves, and Pete McCann.
Mr. Pietro received a bachelor’s degree in music education
from the University of North Texas. He has a master’s degree in
jazz composition from NYU, where he is currently assistant
16
professor of jazz studies. He is sponsored by Rico Reeds and
Conn-Selmer, Inc.
Dave Ratajczak
Dave Ratajczak (drums) is one of the most sought-after
percussionists in the New York metropolitan area. Mr. Ratajczak
has performed and recorded with a wide variety of artists and
ensembles, including the Woody Herman Orchestra, Gerry
Mulligan, the New York Philharmonic, Boston Pops, Orchestra of
St. Luke’s, Kenny Rankin, Audra McDonald, Barbara Cook,
Rosemary Clooney, Bebe Neuwirth, Christine Ebersole, Plácido
Domingo, Lea Salonga, and jazz greats Eddie Daniels, Grady
Tate, and Milt Hinton.
Mr. Ratajczak has performed in the orchestras for Tony
Award–winning Broadway shows such as Mary Poppins, City of
Angels, Crazy for You, Titanic, The Music Man, Wonderful Town,
and Sweet Charity. As a studio musician, he has performed on
several movie soundtracks, including Dead Man Walking, Cradle
Will Rock, Wolf, The Pelican Brief, Miller’s Crossing, Brighton
Beach Memoirs, and Biloxi Blues. He can be seen in the starring
role of an award-winning movie short called The Drummer,
available at thedrummershort.com.
Mr. Ratajczak was called upon to recreate the role of jazz
drumming great Gene Krupa in a performance with Bob Wilber’s
orchestra celebrating the 50th anniversary of Benny Goodman’s
historic jazz concert at Carnegie Hall. He is a graduate of the
Eastman School of Music.
17
American Songbook
In 1998, Lincoln Center launched American Songbook,
dedicated to the celebration of popular American song. Designed
to highlight and affirm the creative mastery of America’s
songwriters from their emergence at the turn of the 19th century
up through the present, American Songbook spans all styles and
genres, from the form’s early roots in Tin Pan Alley and Broadway
to the eclecticism of today’s singer-songwriters. American
Songbook also showcases the outstanding interpreters of popular
song, including established and emerging concert, cabaret,
theater, and songwriter performers.
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (LCPA) serves three
primary roles: presenter of artistic programming, national leader in
arts and education and community relations, and manager of the
Lincoln Center campus. A presenter of more than 3,000 free and
ticketed events, performances, tours, and educational activities
annually, LCPA offers 15 programs, series, and festivals including
American Songbook, Great Performers, Lincoln Center Festival,
Lincoln Center Out of Doors, Midsummer Night Swing, the Mostly
Mozart Festival, and the White Light Festival, as well as the Emmy
Award–winning Live From Lincoln Center, which airs nationally on
18
PBS. As manager of the Lincoln Center campus, LCPA provides
support and services for the Lincoln Center complex and the 11
resident organizations. In addition, LCPA led a $1.2 billion campus
renovation, completed in October 2012.
Lincoln Center Programming Department
Jane Moss, Ehrenkranz Artistic Director
Hanako Yamaguchi, Director, Music Programming
Jon Nakagawa, Director, Contemporary Programming
Lisa Takemoto, Production Manager
Bill Bragin, Director, Public Programming
Charles Cermele, Producer, Contemporary Programming
Kate Monaghan, Associate Director, Programming
Jill Sternheimer, Associate Producer, Public Programming
Mauricio Lomelin, Associate Producer, Contemporary Programming
Nicole Cotton, Production Coordinator
Regina Grande, Assistant to the Artistic Director
Julia Lin, Programming Associate
Ann Crews Melton, House Program Coordinator
Kristin Renee Young, House Seat Coordinator
For American Songbook
Matt Berman, Lighting Design
Scott Stauffer, Sound Design
For Live From Lincoln Center
Elizabeth W. Scott, Chief Media and Digital Officer
Andrew C. Wilk, Executive Producer
Douglas Chang, Series Producer
Eileen Bernstein, Supervising Producer
Danielle Schiffman, Legal Counsel
Daisy Placeres, Production Manager
Kristy Geslain, Associate Producer
Cheryl Fusco, Production Associate
For James Naughton
Laurie Churba, Wardrobe Stylist
19
20
Program and artists are subject to change without notice.
This material is current at the time of production. Please refer
to this evening’s Playbill or inquire of the house staff for any
program changes.
Large Print and Braille Programs are a service of the
Lincoln Center Department of Programs and Services for
People with Disabilities. This program has been prepared for
American Songbook at Lincoln Center.
Department of Programs and Services for People with
Disabilities, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc., 1881
Broadway, 3rd Floor, New York, New York, 10023-6583. Phone:
875-5375. Accessibility Hotline: 875-5380.
Department of Programs and Services
for People with Disabilities (PSPD)
21
All of Lincoln Center’s services for patrons with disabilities,
such as these program notes, are made possible through
generous private contributions. We need your assistance to
continue to provide these services. If you enjoyed these program
notes, and would like to help us maintain this and other services
for people with disabilities, won’t you please consider making a
contribution to support them today? Contributions are tax
deductible to the extent permitted by law. Checks should be
made payable to Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. and
mailed to the Department of Programs and Services for People
with Disabilities at the address above. Contribution forms are
also available at the PSPD information table in the lobby. We
thank you in advance, and look forward to the pleasure of your
company at future Lincoln Center performances.
If you would like to give feedback or volunteer for our
department, please contact PSPD at (212) 875-5375 or by email
at [email protected]
A copy of the last annual report filed with the New York State
Office of the Attorney General may be obtained upon request by
writing to New York State Office of the Attorney General,
Charities Bureau, 120 Broadway, New York, New York 10271 or
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc., 70 Lincoln Center
Plaza, New York, New York 10023-6583.