Master of Marvel: Andrew Lloyd Webber
2019-11-22 15:00 - 16:30 (America/New_York) | Residence at Otter Creek, 50 Lodge Road, Middlebury, VT, 05753
British composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has created a global empire unrivaled in the history of musical theater. In 1983, he was the first composer to have three musicals appear simultaneously on Broadway and in London’s West End, a feat he duplicated five years later. Mr. Webber has collected a variety of honors including knighthood, seven Tony Awards, three Grammy Awards, seven Olivier Awards, a Golden Globe, an Oscar and the Kennedy Center Honors Award. His ninth musical, The Phantom of the Opera, celebrated its 10,000th Broadway performance in 2012, the first production ever to do so.

A Step in Time: Fred Astaire
2019-11-26 19:30 - 20:30 | Longwood at Oakmont, 500 Route 909, Verona, PA, 15147, United States
Light on his feet, Fred Astaire revolutionized the movie musical with his elegant and seemingly effortless dance style. He may have made dancing look easy, but he was a well-known perfectionist, and his work was the product of endless hours of practice.
Astaire started performing as a child, partnering up with his older sister Adele. The two toured the vaudeville circuit before making it to Broadway in 1917. Among their many productions the brother-sister team starred in the 1927 George and Ira Gershwin musical Funny Face. For all his early success, though, career in the movies eluded Astaire. He had done a screen test, but he failed to attract any interest. A studio executive wrote at the time, “Can’t sing. Can’t act. Slightly balding. Can dance a little.” He eventually appeared in 36 musical films.

Andrew Lloyd Webber
2019-12-03 19:00 - 21:30 | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States
British composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has created a global empire unrivaled in the history of musical theater. In 1983, he was the first composer to have three musicals appear simultaneously on Broadway and in London’s West End, a feat he duplicated five years later. Mr. Webber has collected a variety of honors including knighthood, seven Tony Awards, three Grammy Awards, seven Olivier Awards, a Golden Globe, an Oscar and the Kennedy Center Honors Award. His ninth musical, The Phantom of the Opera, celebrated its 10,000th Broadway performance in 2012, the first production ever to do so.
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The Sound of Music
2019-12-05 18:45 - 21:00 | Smithsonian Dillon Ripley Center, 1100 Jefferson Dr SW, Washington, D.C., DC, United States
The original Broadway production of The Sound of Music, starring Mary Martin and Theodore Bikel, opened in 1959 and won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical, out of nine nominations. The first London production opened at the Palace Theatre in 1961. The show has enjoyed numerous productions and revivals since then. It was adapted as a film musical starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, which won five Academy Awards. It is the most popular film musical ever produced. The Sound of Music was the last musical written by Rodgers and Hammerstein; Oscar Hammerstein died of stomach cancer nine months after the Broadway premiere.

A Step in Time: Fred Astaire
2019-12-06 03:00 - 16:00 | Goodwin House, 4800 Fillmore Street, Alexandria, VA, United States

Oliver!
2019-12-23 13:00 - 14:00 | Project Independence, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753
After being sold to a mortician, young orphan Oliver Twist runs away and meets a group of boys trained to be pickpockets by an elderly mentor.The story of the Charles Dickens character leaps onto the cinematic stage with suspense, gaiety and wonderful songs by Lionel Bart and John Green.

The Sound of Music
2020-01-08 19:00 - 21:00 | Isley Library, 75 Main Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753, United States
Please come to Isley Library to attend the Diamond Jubilee of The Sound of Music! The original Broadway production, starring Mary Martin and Theodore Bikel, opened at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 16, 1959 and won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical, out of nine nominations. In 1965, it was adapted as a film musical starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, winning five Academy Awards and becoming the most popular Hollywood musical ever produced. The Sound of Music was the last of 10 musicals written by Rodgers and Hammerstein; Oscar Hammerstein died of stomach cancer nine months after the Broadway premiere. So raise your glasses and celebrate 60 years of enjoyment!

Judy Garland: Climbing Over the Rainbow
2020-01-10 14:00 - 15:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States
Enjoy your fantasies and remembrances as Robert Wyatt takes you through Judy Garland’s extraordinary life. Film clips will be abundant, starting with The Broadway Melody of 1938 and moving through 1944 blockbuster Meet Me in St. Louis, The Harvey Girls, Cole Porter’s gem-ridden The Pirate of 1948 and the sizzling A Star is Born, the 1954 masterwork which became her last bravura film. TV specials like The Judy Garland Show (1962) with Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, the specials that featured Robert Goulet still basking from Camelot and, of course, the prized duos with daughter Liza Minnelli, will stimulate your thoughts about “America’s Sweetheart.”

The World of Lerner & Loewe
2020-01-31 13:00 - 14:00 | Project Independence, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753
In temperament, personality and background, Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe were perhaps the most dissimilar of all of the great songwriting teams. Yet together they penned some of the most original and successful musicals written during the Golden Age of Broadway, hits beginning with Brigadoon in 1947 and ending with Gigi in 1973. Between those bookends fell Paint Your Wagon, the blockbuster My Fair Lady which made Julie Andrews an over-night sensation, and Camelot, starring Ms. Andrews, Richard Burton and Robert Goulet in his Broadway debut. Often at odds with each other personally, their

Steps in Time: Fred Astaire
2020-02-10 13:00 - 14:00 | Project Independence, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753

The Ragtime Craze
2020-02-28 14:00 - 15:30 | Residence at Quarry Hill, 465 Quarry Hill Road, South Burlington, VT, 05403, United States
Although ragtime music was first heard at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893, it took another seven years for the syncopated music to become the rage of the new century. Scott Joplin wrote the bulk of the most-remembered classical piano rags, but dozens of other composers vied for his recognition. From Kansas City came James Scott and Joseph Lamb who arrived in New York City from across the river in New Jersey. But then the barons of the music publishing industry on Tin Pan Alley flooded the market with cheap imitations which soured the buyers of sheet music. Ragtime music was finished by 1917, the year that Joplin died. This program includes scores of archival recordings and clips, as well as live performance by Dr. Wyatt.

Music in the Movies
2020-03-05 19:30 | Coral Lakes, 12751 El Clair Ranch Road, Boyton Beach, FL, 33437, United States
Beginning with The Jazz Singer in 1927, music has been an integral part of the motion picture films. While stimulating emotion, broadening the plot, creating drama and intrigue, the correct song at an opportune moment projects incredible power. Musical films have bequeathed us many of the finest songs of all time. Enjoy them with memorable clips combined with live piano performance.

The Cotton Club
2020-03-07 13:00 - 14:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States
The Cotton Club, favored by the city’s elite, was dubbed “the Aristocrat of Harlem.” Its patrons included British royalty and celebrities like George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Paul Whiteman and Marlene Dietrich. Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway conducted their innovative jazz bands and great black entertainers like Ethel Waters, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Lena Horne and Josephine Baker played the room to the delight of the all-white audience.
Feel the magnetic attraction of the Cotton Club in this lecture/recital presented by Robert Wyatt. Film and sound clips will partner with colorful stories which illustrate the musical and social life of New York in the 1920s and 30s.

A Tribute to a King: Elvis Presley
2020-03-23 00:00 - 2020-05-22 14:00 | Project Independence, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753
On Sept. 9, 1956, more than 60 million people witnessed a young entertainer with gyrating hips and a honey-coated baritone voice croon his way into national consciousness on The Ed Sullivan Show. His rubbery legs spread wide apart, head thrown carelessly back and mouth twitching, it was apparent that this man was different. With an onstage persona that magnified unbridled sensuality and a versatile musical style which drew from rock and roll, gospel, blues, country and pop, Elvis Aaron Presley exuded charms that would make him the best-selling solo artist in the history of popular music.

Steps in Time: Fred Astaire
2020-03-27 15:30 - 17:00 | The Gables at East Mountain, 200 Gables Place, Rutland, VT, 05701, United States

All That Jazz!
2020-04-07 09:00 - 10:00 | WCAI – 90.1 FM
Jazz has been, from its very beginnings at the turn of the 20th century, a constantly evolving, expanding, changing music, passing through several distinctive phases of development. Spend a Saturday morning with George Scharr and Robert Wyatt exploring its history and sampling its history. Life music will flavor the story.

Gershwin, by George!
2020-04-07 14:00 - 15:30 | University of Vermont, Nolan-Murray Center, 10 Pleasant Street, Springfield, Vermont, 05150
Join pianist and Gershwin authority Robert Wyatt, co-editor of Oxford University Press’ The George Gershwin Reader, in this lively program exploring George Gershwin’s life and legacy. The evening includes live performances of the solo version of Rhapsody in Blue, early and unpublished music, the piano improvisations and other Gershwin hits. Rare film footage obtained from the Gershwin family is projected, along with unpublished photographs of the composer and his friends. Archival recordings of his 1932 – 33 radio programs, Music by Gershwin, are also featured.

All That Jazz!
2020-04-18 10:00 - 12:00 | Falmouth Academy, 7 Highfield Drive, Falmouth, MA, 02540, United States

Lerner & Loewe: Musical Champagne
2020-05-15 15:00 - 16:30 | Residence at Otter Creek, 50 Lodge Road, Middlebury, VT, 05753
In temperament and background, Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe were wildly dissimilar, but the two accommodated their often tempestuous relationship to generate brilliantly crafted musicals such as Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, My Fair Lady, Gigi, and Camelot.
Learn the origins of enduring songs like Almost Like Being in Love, The Night They Invented Champagne, I Could Have Danced All Night, If Ever I Would Leave You, and They Call the Wind Maria; enjoy clips from the film adaptations of the stage productions; explore personal correspondence; and probe the dual genius of this Viennese composer and silver-spooned New York lyricist in a lively evening led by pianist and American music specialist Robert Wyatt.

Gertrude Lawrence: The Ghost of the Cape Cod Playhouse
2020-08-16 18:30 - 20:00 | Olde Colonial Courthouse, 3046 Main Street, Barnstable Village, MA, 02630, United States
August 17 @ 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm

Gertrude Lawrence Gertrude Lawrence was one of Great Britain’s brightest theatrical stars during the first half of the 20th century. A lifelong friend and colleague of Noel Coward, Lawrence ‘s forte was sophisticated musical comedy, where she exuded a lively, charismatic stage presence that easily overcame her shortcomings as a singer. She was sometimes criticized for a small vocal range and a tendency to sing flat, but her emotional commitment and flat-out star power earned her the approval of most of the musical legends she worked with: the Gershwins, Cole Porter, Kurt Weill and Rodgers & Hammerstein. Her connection to Cape Cod came later in her career when she married producer and aficionado Richard Aldrich in 1940. Their life together was dear and rewarding and, fifteen years after her death, Aldrich published Mrs. A: An Intimate Biography of a Great Star, the definitive book on Lawrence’s life and career.

Gertrude Lawrence: The Ghost of the Cape Cod Playhouse
2020-08-17 18:30 - 20:00 | Olde Colonial Courthouse, 3046 Main Street, Barnstable Village, MA, 02630, United States
Gertrude Lawrence Gertrude Lawrence was one of Great Britain’s brightest theatrical stars during the first half of the 20th century. A lifelong friend and colleague of Noel Coward, Lawrence ‘s forte was sophisticated musical comedy, where she exuded a lively, charismatic stage presence that easily overcame her shortcomings as a singer. She was sometimes criticized for a small vocal range and a tendency to sing flat, but her emotional commitment and flat-out star power earned her the approval of most of the musical legends she worked with: the Gershwins, Cole Porter, Kurt Weill and Rodgers & Hammerstein. Her connection to Cape Cod came later in her career when she married producer and aficionado Richard Aldrich in 1940. Their life together was dear and rewarding and, fifteen years after her death, Aldrich published Mrs. A: An Intimate Biography of a Great Star, the definitive book on Lawrence’s life and career.

Steps in Time: Fred Astaire
2020-08-19 19:30 - 21:00 | Heatherwood, Route 6A , Yarmouth Port, MA , 02675

Gershwin, by George!
2020-10-29 13:30 - 15:00 | University of Vermont, 115 Eastern Avenue, St. Johnsbury, VT, 05819, United States

The Sound of Music
2020-11-13 14:00 - 15:30 | Goodwin House, 4800 Fillmore Street, Alexandria, VA, United States
The original Broadway production of The Sound of Music, starring Mary Martin and Theodore Bikel, opened in 1959 and won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical, out of nine nominations. The first London production opened at the Palace Theatre in 1961. The show has enjoyed numerous productions and revivals since then. It was adapted as a film musical starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, which won five Academy Awards. It is the most popular film musical ever produced. The Sound of Music was the last musical written by Rodgers and Hammerstein; Oscar

The Musical Genius of Cole Porter and Irving Berlin
2020-11-14 10:00 - 16:30 | Smithsonian S. Dillon Ripley Center, 1100 Jefferson Dr SW, Washington, D.C., 20560
Irving Berlin, a Russian immigrant, had no formal musical training and could not read or notate music. Cole Porter was wealthy and privileged and had extensive musical training. Berlin spoke to the American heart in sentimental ballads with infectious rhythms. Porter reflected the social elite with witty, fashionable, and often cynical lyrics and elegant melodies. Both wrote the music and lyrics to their works, and they dominated musical theater and popular song for 40 years.

Andrew Lord Webber: A Master of Marvels
2020-12-09 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States
British composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has created a global empire unrivaled in the history of musical theatre. In 1983, he was the first composer to have three musicals simultaneously on Broadway and in London’s West End, a feat he duplicated five years later. The New York production of The Phantom of the Opera, which opened in 1988, is now nearing 13,000 performances and was joined this last season by a Broadway revival of another of the composer’s megahits, Cats.
Lloyd Webber’s phenomenal successes can be attributed to a particular blend of showmanship and superb craft—the genesis of which began in childhood. The son of professional musicians, he also possessed passions for architecture, history, mechanics, and staging, which fostered in him an ability to envision productions of astonishing complexity and grandeur.
Join music specialist Robert Wyatt as he raises the curtain on a lively afternoon that examines and celebrates Andrew Lloyd Webber’s theatrical artistry, filled with clips and recordings that cover the full range of his career from his earliest to most recent works.

The Beatles
2020-12-10 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States
The Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. With members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, they became widely regarded as the foremost and most influential music band in history. Rooted in skiffle, beat and 1950s rock and roll, the Beatles later experimented with several musical styles, ranging from pop ballads and Indian music to psychedelia and hard rock, often incorporating classical elements and unconventional recording techniques in innovative ways. In 1963, their enormous popularity first emerged as “Beatlemania”; as the group’s music grew in sophistication, led by primary songwriters Lennon and McCartney, the band were integral to pop music’s evolution into an art form and to the development of the counterculture of the 1960s.

A Tribute to a King: Elvis Presley
2021-01-12 16:30 - 18:00 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States

The Hollywood Musical: Four Decades of Magic! Part 1
2021-02-09 14:00 - 15:30 | Residence at Otter Creek, 50 Lodge Road, Middlebury, VT, 05753
The golden age of the Hollywood musical coincided with the greatest era of American songwriting. Music-makers like Berlin, Gershwin, Porter, Kern, and Rodgers and Hart wrote brilliant songs and then shuffled them across the continent from theaters in New York to the film studios in California.
The Vitaphone crackles of the first musical talkie traveled in the opposite direction: from the Hollywood sound stages of Warner Bros. to its 1927 world premiere in Manhattan, where audiences heard Al Jolson speak his prophetic line, “Wait a minute, wait a minute…you ain’t heard nothin’ yet!” The sensation created by The Jazz Singer began four decades of melodious invention as the Hollywood musical dominated the landscape of the American film industry. This first of a four-session series pays tribute to the great musicals of the 1930s.

The Hollywood Musical: The 1960s
2021-02-16 10:00 - 11:30 | Project Independence, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753
Films created during the 1960s belong to the most creative era in cinema history, a time of tremendous social change, the Vietnam War, fashion, fads, rock ‘n’ roll and the acceleration of technological ingenuity. However, movie audiences were rapidly diminishing due to the dominance of the television industry and only 145 musicals were produced in the decade, compared to the 453 all-singing, all-dancing extravaganzas churned out in the 1930s.
Be entertained throughout an evening which features dazzling film clips of your favorite stars and a historical narrative by American music specialist, Robert Wyatt. Enjoy the emergence of Barbara Streisand, witness Julie Andrews transform from a nanny to a nun in only a year, and reserve a front row seat while drifting back to a time when admission to a movie house equaled a six-pack of beer!
