Review: GET HAPPY: MICHAEL FEINSTEIN CELEBRATES THE JUDY GARLAND CENTENNIAL at Feinstein's/54 Below Does Judy Proud

Michael Feinstein is nothing less than a hero. He has spent most of his life working to preserve The Great American Songbook, he has worked tirelessly in an effort to keep the art form of cabaret alive, creating nightclubs in cities across this country where singers could perform the types of shows that lovers old and new of the cabaret genre can enjoy, and even today he is doing something heroic, right here in New York City. Michael Feinstein is bringing to the citizens of Manhattan the legendary Judy Garland.

Last night Mr. Feinstein opened his second week and his second show at the club on 54th Street that bears his name, a club that has been called "Broadway's Living Room" and that is often referred to by a name that harkens back to a more elegant time - for the nightclub Feinstein's/54 Below is known in NYC as a Supper Club. You can call 54 Below whatever you like, this writer calls it heaven and a haven. It is especially heavenly right now and that is because of Feinstein and this two-part program celebrating Judy Garland.

The full title of the show playing in the seven pm slot is GET HAPPY: Michael Feinstein CELEBRATES THE Judy Garland CENTENNIAL. It's a mouthful but it tells the audience exactly what they are getting, and there is an audience for this show, even one hundred years after Judy Garland's birth. There is, though, every possibility that there are patrons of the club who will attend this presentation who don't care about Judy Garland (unthinkable, impossible, sacrilege) and who are attending the concert expressly to see Michael Feinstein, and why not? At a certain point during his performance last night, a woman seated in the theater hollered out, "YOU'RE ADORABLE!", prompting the star of the show to break character (and to break free of his well-crafted script of Garland tales and trivia, enjoyable each time that Michael let glimmers of his real self out) and say, "Excuse me?". The patron yelled back her impressions of the man even louder, making Michael blush a little bit, also a delight to see. To be clear for those not in the know: no grown man wants to be told he is adorable. Puppies are adorable. Children are adorable. Acceptable compliments for a grown man range from handsome to good looking, from sexy to hot, but never adorable. In spite of Feinstein's fan's poor selection of vocabulary, it cannot be denied that Michael Feinstein is incredibly appealing. He is outgoing but formidable, intelligent but accessible, movie star handsome with a pair of eyes so blue that you could see them if you were in the last row of Yankee Stadium looking at him on the pitcher's mound. Add to that one of the most powerful and nuanced singing voices in the business, a singing voice that people forget is iconic in its own right, and you have an entertainer that people will want to see, whether he is presenting the music of Sesame Street, KISS, or Judy Garland, It just so happens that, right now, he is singing the Judy Garland canon.

And this is where the magic really happens.

Part one of Mr. Feinstein's program was presented last week, and it focused on Garland's early years - the years of Vaudeville, MGM, Dorothy Gale, and Esther Smith. (Read Bobby Patrick's review HERE). This week's performances focus on the Judy Garland concert years, the years during which the Academy Award nominee (and recipient of a special Oscar for The Wizard of Oz) performed over one thousand live shows around the world. Touching ever so lightly on her later films (especially the greatest version of A Star Is Born ever made), Mr. Feinstein recounts interesting, and often quite humorous, stories from Judy's life at work and at home. He deftly and delicately brings the children into the trajectory of the evening without making it about them; he respectfully and resolutely mentions the unhappiness and the struggles without allowing it to dominate the conversation. Michael's genuine love and admiration for the artist that was Judy Garland, and for the mother of three people whom he calls friends, is on full display, along with Judy's music, and his own prowess. He is a brilliant curator, and not just in his script, not just in the songs he has chosen as the structure of his show, but in the photos and documents used in a continual visual presentation that fills the 54 Below monitors. It isn't just a tribute show to Judy Garland and her work that Feinstein has created: it is an acknowledgment of every emotion, every experience, every significant moment in the histories of every Judy Garland fan in the seats.

Starting the evening with the JUDY AT Carnegie Hall overture (easily one of the most recognizable in the history of music) Musical Director Titan Tedd Firth makes three instruments on the stage sound like an orchestra, and as the musicians played through the arrangement to the moment when Feinstein will enter, audience members last night reacted, visibly, to this music that was so ingrained in their beings. It stayed that way throughout the night, as Garland fans of all ages mouthed the words with Michael (some even daring to allow the notes to escape their throats), clapped along, smiled with their associations to the compositions, and cried when the spirit moved them. It was spirit, too. It was Judy's spirit, it was Michael's spirit, it was Liza, Lorna, and Joe's spirits. Every person who has been touched by the Judy Garland legend, whether through ardor of Judy or admiration of her famous children, whether from a movie, a record album, or a television special watched on repeat on YouTube, will be unable to halt the flood of emotions brought out by this concert. Speaking personally, this writer was rendered teary-eyed by a Tedd Firth arrangement (and Michael Feinstein performance ) that incorporated a delicate ballad from A Star Is Born with three different tributes to each of Judy's children, but, looking around the room at 54 Below, it was clear that each patron was having a different, a personal, response to each number, all of them either astonishingly arranged by Firth or preserving famous Garland arrangements that we have all come to rely on in our musical enjoyment of her catalog - arrangements so famous that singers crave to sing them. Mr. Feinstein balances both within his program, but this writer won't be naming any of the songs. There is no benefit in spoiling the surprises for future audiences that deserve to experience the set in real-time. Suffice it to say, it is an elegant and emotional experience, filled with joy and optimism.

On the subject of optimism, it dawned on this music lover and cabaret journalist, rather late in the evening, that Michael Feinstein's voice (one unchanged by the passage of time) carries with it a kind of optimism. It's such a pretty voice, so recognizable as to be a comfort to those who have listened to it for long stretches of time, a voice that can be as loud as an echo in the Grand Canyon or as silent as the fluttering of the wings of a hummingbird. Mr. Feinstein has these high notes that he creates that are so tender, so rich with expression, so artistic in their humanity, that hearing them, one is reminded of the sound of wind passing through the pipes of a church organ, and in those moments of those sweet, natural sounds, one cannot help but feel hopeful, connected to something grounded in the earth, and most definitely reminiscent of the skills that made Judy Garland the storyteller that she was.

How appropriate that Mr. Feinstein should be the person to present this truly lovely and entertaining look at her life and work.

The GET HAPPY band is David Finck on bass, Mark McLean on drums, and Musical Director/arranger Tedd Firth on piano. Michael Feinstein does play the piano during this concert.

Get Happy: Michael Feinstein Celebrates the Judy Garland Centennial plays Feinstein's/54 Below at 7 pm through December 26th. For information and tickets visit the 54 Below website HERE.

THIS is the Michael Feinstein website.

Photos by Stephen Mosher

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