Broadway comes to JMU

Neil Berg helps celebrate 100 years of musicals

By Megan Williams, a&e editor
Posted on September 24, 2007

For fans of Broadway, Wednesday night was their version of a rock concert. They got to hear the best of Broadway, and they just had to go to Wilson Hall.

Neil Berg’s “100 Years of Broadway” showcased five Broadway veterans who dazzled the audience with renditions of classic Broadway tunes such as “All That Jazz” from “Chicago” and “Think of Me” from “Phantom of the Opera.” Just as the title suggests, the performance spanned decades of Broadway trends. Berg provided the audience with colorful and humorous anecdotes about the musicals between numbers.

Wilson Hall auditorium was packed with students, staff and Harrisonburg residents of all ages. The show opened appropriately with “Give My Regards to Broadway” which was written in 1904, epitomizing the idea of Berg’s show.

Berg, who was one of the four musicians in the band, played piano and narrated the show.

“It’s great to be back in college,” Berg said.

The performers were introduced as they came out to perform their first number.  Carter Calvert, who starred in “Smoky Joe’s Café” and “Cats,” opened with “All That Jazz.” Erick Buckley, the star of such Broadway musicals as “Les Miserables” and “Grease,” performed “This is the Moment” from “Jekyll and Hyde.” Danny Zolli came out and impressed the audience by singing “Sherry” by Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons.  Ray McLeod, a bass baritone who has worked with actor Will Smith and Broadway star Michael Crawford, sang “Some Enchanted Evening” from “South Pacific.”

“She played Christine Daae in ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ for five years, and most importantly she’s my wife,” said Berg as he introduced the fifth performer Rita Harvey who sang the beautiful aria “Think of Me.”

The first half of the show was dedicated to the classics with a montage of songs from “Grease” including “Summer Nights” and “Grease Lightning,” as well as “Don Quixote.” Ray McCloud sang “Man of La Mancha” and “Impossible Dream” which was impressive due to his resounding voice and vocal intensity.

The first act also included songs from the era Berg refers to as the “jukebox invasion,” where pop songs were forced into musicals.

“This didn’t usually work,” Berg said. “Except for a few songs, one of them being “I’m a Woman” from “Smoky Joe’s Café.”

Rita Harvey and Christine Carver had the audience  clapping along as they sang their rendition of this classic “jukebox” tune.

The first act concluded with a show stopping selection from “Jesus Christ Superstar,” Andrew Lloyd Webber’s first produced musical, which was inspired by the music and turmoil of the late ’60s and early ’70s. Danny Zolli, who has performed in this classic musical more than any other person in history, sang “Gethsemane” and the first act ended on a note that left the audience speechless. 

After a brief intermission the show reconvened with a few more Broadway classics such as “Who Knows” from “West Side Story” and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” which according to the Recording Industry Association of America is the number one American song of the century as voted on by various individuals chosen by the RIAA. The show then took a more contemporary turn with songs from classic rock artists Elton John and Billy Joel.

“If any contemporary musician should have been a composer for Broadway it should have been Billy Joel,” Berg said. Zolli sang “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant” which was featured in the 2002 show “Movin’ Out.”

While Berg introduced the band, he decided to do something “out of the ordinary.” Because keyboardist Lieutenant Dan Walker’s family was in the audience Berg offered the microphone and piano to Walker to sing a number. He sang Elton John’s classic “Your Song,” dedicating it to his family.

“What makes a song great, and what makes a song the greatest song of all time?” Berg said to the audience as the show was climbing towards the finale. “Is it the melody? The lyrics? The rhythm? I think it is the historical context in which a song is written. So our last two songs are going to be, in my opinion, the greatest songs in the history of Broadway.”

The first was sung by Ray McLeod, and was “Ol’ Man River” from the 1927 classic, “Showboat.” The song tells the story of hardships faced by blacks at the time. The shows finale was appropriately “Phantom of the Opera” from the musical of the same name which is the longest running show in Broadway history. It was sung by Rita Harvey and Erick Buckley, both of whom are veterans of the show.

As the audience rose to their feet in a long round of applause, Berg and the performers agreed to one more. For the first time all night, all five artists came together for a song. The encore number was “Seasons of Love” from the hit musical “Rent,” which begs the question “How do you a measure a year?”

Neil Berg asked himself a similar question.

 “How do you measure 100 years?”

The answer is two hours of some of the best and most beloved Broadway songs that have been performed by five artists who have contributed to the history of Broadway. The beauty of Berg’s show is that its purpose is not to further his own career, although it will undoubtedly do so, but to honor the careers of those composers and directors that have written the history of the past 100 years of Broadway.