Customer Reviews

First Lady Suite - A Musical (Premiere Recording)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I really want to recommend close and repeated listening to this CD. Even though i'm a big fan of La Chiusa's Marie Christine and Wild Party, my first hearing of this show left me cold. The show seemed too unstructured to really carry a listener along - remembering that the experience of a show heard on a CD player is totally different from seeing it on a stage. I left the CD alone for months, and it's only because I'm currently working on some other La Chiusa music that I decided to give it another go. This time the show glowed out at me from the speakers. The lyrics are utterly remarkable, the characters honed to perfection and the music lilts between recitative and "numbers" with amazing fluidity, encompassing a vast range of styles that suit the moment ideally. Not all the singing is beautiful but it as always characterful and precise. I recommend this recording to anyone and urge you to put the effort in. It will reward every moment with so much beauty and wisdom.

I've read several rave reviews of this CD now, and indeed it's a superb recording, but the comments were so scholarly that I think they missed the point. For me, the marvel of the score is how playful it is. I'll be the first to declare Michael John LaChiusa a brilliant composer-lyricist, but for me, there's been something wrong with his recent work: the writing remains gorgeous, but I'm too aware of the collaboration and the compromise -- the voice feels only intermittently full-throated. This portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-younger-man clearly belongs to a time when he didn't have the world looking over his shoulder, and he's not afraid to be a little crazy and silly and twisted. That's not to say that the work isn't powerful -- in fact, I found it as powerful as anything he's written precisely because the dramatic moments take you by surprise. LaChiusa's a great story-teller here, and First Lady Suite is a revelation.

Based on the cast recordings of "Hello Again," "Marie Christine," "The Wild Party," and now "First Lady Suite," it's clear that Michael John LaChiusa is the most exciting (and prolific) musical composer of the last ten years. His music is incredibly inventive, his lyrics intelligent, and he has a knack for choosing unlikely and compelling subjects for his shows. His scores, as great as they are, also tend to be somewhat challenging, requiring repeated listenings to fully appreciate. "First Lady Suite" is no exception-- it's not all easy listening at first, but it sticks with you.

Although this recording is from a 2002 production, the show actually pre-dates "Marie Christine" and "The Wild Party," having arrived in the early 90's with "Hello Again." While it's not quite as accomplished as those scores, it's still an impressive achievement. The show is made up of three main parts, each attempting to shed some light on a notable first lady-- in order, they're Jackie Kennedy, Mamie Eisenhower, and Eleanor Roosevelt. The Kennedy sequence is the most serious, taking place on Air Force One the day of the president's assassination. The other two contain a lot of surprising humor, especially the wacky second sequence, which finds Mamie, among other things, flying on her bed through time. Each portrait feels stylistically surreal, with a dreamlike quality, and LaChiusa's unique musical style fits it all very well. There aren't really any easy showtunes here, but he's able to generate a lot of emotion through the music, and the cumulative effect is poignant and memorable.

Great recording of a whacked-out, excellent show. The cast is terrific: most especially Heather Lee and Mary Pat Green ("Eleanor Sleeps Here" is my favorite play.) "Where's Mamie" has got to be my favorite song. Great liner notes, too. The whole thing makes me want to find out more about First Lady history.
It's not easy-listening stuff, like Hairspray, which is easy to get on first listening. But I'm into musicals that get better and better every time you hear them.

Although LaChiusa's work may be a bit strange for some tastes, his work his always entertaining if to say anything at all.
Some beautiful songs, mostly the opening and closing, and clever lyrics tell these wonderful stories of some our most beloved first ladies, Jacky O, Eleanor Roosevelt and others! (There's even a little Amelia Aerhart too.) You won't regret adding it to your musical collection, especially if you enjoyed MARIE CHRISTINE, HELLO AGAIN and THE WILD PARTY (all by LaChiusa).

What a treat to hear such great voices singing early LaChiusa. I especially loved Kate Shindle -- a former Miss America -- making a strong showing in the part of a lesbian. She's a stand-out. This is a must for any fan of cutting-edge 21st century American musical theater.

This early work was the first thing by John Michael LaChiusa to make critics really sit up and take notice, and the idea for it is almost irresistible: three vignetttes about First Ladies (apparently a personal obsession with LaChiusa), all centering around the idea of flight (although in the center story the idea of flight is metaphorical rather than literal). The first story centers upon Jackie Kennedy's weary secretary preparing aboard Air Force one for the fatal trip to Dallas in November, 1963. The second, the only one to focus squarely on a First Lady (rather than on her peripheral aides), features Mamie Eisenhower concerned about the crisis at Little Rock Central High School and also about allegations concerning her husband's WWII affair with Kay Sommersby: in this story Mamie is figured as a wacky and feisty Fifties housewife a la Lucy Ricardo (this turns out to be as ghastly an idea in practice as it looks). The third story, by far the strongest, centers upon Lorena Hickok, Eleanor Roosevelt's companion and lover, as Mrs. Roosevelt is coaxed by Amelia Earhardt to fly from DC to Baltimore.

The biggest problem with the work is that all three pieces center upon someone complaining and complaining and complaining about her lot. It's hard to work up much enthusiasm for the work when all the characters seem to be telling you they'd rather be anywhere but onstage. Also, LaChiusa is hardly the most tuneful of composers, which makes the work--really a sort of doodle--not as much fun as you'd hope. Gregory Jbarra scores the strongest among a talented cast as a patient and patronizing Eisenhower, and there are a few funny characterizations (a doughty and eccentric Eleanor Roosevelt, a zombified lady Bird Johnson stalking through the presidential plane in the Jackie Kennedy piece) that are a bit redemptive. But there's nothing LaChiusa says here that wasn't said more eloquently already in the great Pat Nixon scenes of John Adams's NIXON IN CHINA (a clear inspiration for this work).

Don't buy this cd. It is dramatic to the point of melodrama, and it's annoying. The performances are bordering on ridiculous because they are so over the top. The music isn't some of LaChiusa's best either. This is one that should just be quietly forgotten. It will make you tired to listen to it. The unending references to flying will grate on your nerves if nothing else will!