Jacqueline Jonée: Video Vérité (6/17/13)

This is the third time I’ve seen Jacqueline Jonée, the Premier Piano Drag Diva. This year’s presentation was a video tour of highlights from years past. The four segments of the video were drawn from Liberté, Egalité, Jacqueline Jonée in Concert (I’m so glad I’ve mastered rudimentary HTML), A Date with Liberace, Sofari So Goody, and My Favorite Things (see my blog post of 6/20/12).

The highlights from the videos included a lot of Ms. Jonée’s bravura-style playing, assisted by the JouJou Jacquettes Philharmonic Orchestra. The names of the pieces, Liszt, Chopin, Rachmaninoff, among others, don’t come readily to me and there was not enough light for me to take readable, easy-to-access notes. Highlights of the comedy from the videos included a very funny bit where her wig gets tangled in the microphone at the piano and the stage manager has to come out and disentangle her. In one of the earlier clips, she keeps saying that she’s always dreamed of playing the Bruno Walter Auditorium, the hall at the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts. Finally, her concertmaster tells her she really is playing the house. Later she refers to it as the Walter Bruno Auditorium and a third time (jokes are always in threes, right?) as the Barbara Walters Auditorium. Her Date with Liberace obviously gave her ample opportunity to display audacious costumes, along with that solid piano technique of hers. Carousel, from “Jacques Brel Is Alive ...” gets funnier and funnier the faster it goes. And the page-turning episode, from My Favorite Things (I think) with the rabbi displaying impeccable comic timing is very, very funny—choreographed down to a head-nodding T.  Did I mention that the rabbi was the page turner?  From a videography standpoint, the later two segments (Sofari and Favorite Things) were clearer and easier to hear. Another big plus in all four video segments is a photo montage of
Ms. Jonée with adoring fans—of whom there are many.

Après video, the JouJou Jacquettes Orchestra du jour was introduced, and Ms. Jonée made her entrance in a vibrant blue gown and her trademark big, blonde hair. There were four pieces performed. We had heard snippets of them throughout the videos, as they are “set pieces” that get performed regularly—and why not? since the orchestrations already exist. A note, the orchestrations are a bit fluid, as the clientele and scoring of the orchestra is not always the same.

We heard a wonderful Bernstein amalgam of America, Nothing’s Gonna Harm You, and There’s a Place for Us. This is a very nice interweaving of the tunes, with rhythms bent, and phrases intermingled. And very effective. My Buddy is a rather straightforward rendition of a lovely tune, and in this day and age when we honor so many who have been lost to AIDS (and for anyone who has lost someone near and dear to them), the last line, “Your buddy, misses you,” is achingly poignant.

At this point, Ms. Jonée paused, conversed with an audience member and then said, “We have a request. But we’re going to play the next piece anyway!” It was announced as A Gershwin Mudley—er, Medley. We had Rhapsody in Blue, I Got Rhythm, Fascinatin’ Rhythm, etc. Uptempo fun.

The closer was another wonderful amalgam that included I Am What I Am, Over the Rainbow, and the last line of the Star Spangled Banner—“o’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.” A fitting tribute to Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Pride month. Merci, mademoiselle Jacqueline Jonée!

ConcertMeister
p.s. Thanks, Pheas. I get by with a little help from my phriends