FAVOURITE SONGS: 'Hello, Dolly!', HELLO, DOLLY!

A delight of the newly launched Encore Radio is its eclectic (if somewhat limited) playlist of showtunes spanning a century or more of musical theatre. There are songs that make you sit up and listen for the first time (hearing "The Schuyler Sisters" twice in a one weekend made me even more impatient for May 2018 to roll round - yes, I have Hamilton tickets) and others that make you listen as if for the first time. Either is a complete joy!

Of course, I knew "Hello, Dolly!" from my childhood, the song a staple of Radio 2, BBC Light Entertainment shows and perhaps also the muzak that would seep into one's skin somehow in the days when nobody wore earbuds in pubs or shops. But hearing it again in 2017 - specifically Carol Channing's version (well, one of them) - it really was a case of hearing the song anew. I guess that'll happen again when I eventually see the show.

Though musical theatre (despite its detractors' claims) is too broad a church to be characterised by a single song, style or storyline, there's something about this number that goes to the heart of what makes the genre so appealing to those with ears to hear and eyes to see.

Though there are countless versions online, and of course Bette Midler's Tony-nominated turn, I'm referencing the 1994 30th Anniversary recording, with Carol well into her seventies - the song her signature number, the role all hers even after Barbra Streisand's turn in the Oscar-winning movie. The song's three decades living inside the singer come through in every note of the performance.

It starts with the brassiest of brass before fading down, and you just know that an entrance - or, I should say, AN ENTRANCE - is being made. Then there's that unmistakable voice, deep, almost mannish, full of cigarette smoke, sex and sass, ageing yet defiant - still here.

The vowels, always the motor of emotion in speech and song, elongated, stretched, all but snapping, the breathy breathing just this side of caricature. As is always, or almost always, the case in musical theatre, the voice is mixed right up - we hear every word, loud and clear.

She greets old friends (men, natch) and tell us she is back where she belongs, owning the joint and its patrons. She dispenses compliments to her admirers while we all know that she means them as much for herself.

You are looking swell, Manny
I can tell, Danny
You're still glowin', you're still crowin'
You're still goin' strong

As if we needed to know, we get some nostalgia, an indication of the old school nature of the show - in the rock 'n' roll Sixties, Broadway was still some years off catching up. It's delivered in a wholly mannered vocal full of artifice, Carol knowing that 30 years on, there is no "top" left over which she can possibly go. In musical terms, it's a free hit and she's not going to miss this one.

The men chorus back their greeting, united as one in their pleasure to see our star (and if this song says one thing above all else, it's that crucial message of musical theatre - "This is our star!"). Truth be told, we're just waiting for Carol to return, though, in our mind's eye, she's lording it over the room and biding her time.

And she doesn't disappoint:

Here's my hat fellas
I'm stayin' where I'm at, fellas

Jerry Herman's language may not be the Queen's English, but it's unmistakably rooted in the New York Jewish argot that gives so much bounce to so many Broadway shows. I'd love the song if that were its only line.

Tomorrow will be brighter than the good old days

Has one of musical theatre's key tropes ever been so succinctly stated? We're looking back to times when things were "good' but looking forward to times when things will be even better! My father loved this Yankee optimism and energy, an inescapable consequence of growing up in the post-war years when America was a mystical land of shiny unrationed goods, handsome leading men and even more handsome leading ladies, and both like Britain but utterly different to our grey grimness: technicolor ballroom vs black and white kitchen sink.

When I was younger, I sneered a little at this naivety - Vietnam had knocked any last vestige of the "Shining City Upon A Hill" vision of the USA - but as I get older, the world becomes larger, more nuanced, more accommodating of contradiction. These days, I don't sneer, I smile, knowing that real life may not match the rhetoric, but who wants to live 24/7 in real life? It's a feeling that I suspect many fans of musical theatre share.

The singing takes a break for some dancing, finger-clicking and knee-slapping before the key changes and the big finish we know, but dare not believe, can come to wrap it up. Music and lyrics embody the blood-red sequinned dress, the painted face and the towering hair - nothing is off-limits now, the 11 o'clock number going all the way to 11, shamelessly so. Here's where you find out if you really are a fan of musical theatre or not, because there's no going back now!

And then the perfect line, perfectly delivered:

Wow! Wow! Wow! Fellas
Look at the old girl now Fellas

"Wow! Wow! Wow!" indeed.

Watch Carol Channing perform "Hello, Dolly!" below

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