On June 2nd Paul McCartney will receive the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song.

The way the Library of Congress describes the award also sheds light on the importance of another DHPAC/FTC mission. ..

We have always supported The Great American Songbook, and provided a venue for studying and performing various forms of popular music. As Merinews reports, the Library of Congress celebrates the way artists use popular music to transcend distinctions between musical styles and idioms, and bring diverse listeners together, in a way which fosters mutual understanding and appreciation.  (Yup, a good Gershwin song will do that. And, a good McCartney song. )

If you look over the Calendar of  Events at DHPAC/Dix Hills Performing Arts Center, you will find a variety of popular music shows. And, with the fall, we will have more opportunities to see live music of The Beatles, including the songs of Paul McCartney!

From “Long Island Sings The Beatles 2010″ at DHPAC:

Gathering Time is an acoustic vocal trio consisting of Glen Roethel, and Stuart Markus, both veterans of the Long Island folk scene, plus the emerging talent of Hillary Foxsong. The trio combines the spirit of Peter Paul and Mary with the exacting harmonies of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young at their peak. This time around, they’re targeting the harmonies of Paul McCartney and John Lennon. Beatles Love Songs With Gathering Time is a Long Island event you won’t want to miss, and a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

For instance…below are our five upcoming shows, including: theatre, comedy and music. Choose only the categories you like, or take a leap and explore something new.


Just some of the Long Island events coming up at DHPAC…

Five Towns College Theatre performs Shakespeare
Macbeth
Thursday April 15-Sunday April 18

Music
Caberet At Its Best
Wednesday, April 21 at 5pm

Comedy
The Adventures of Jackie “The Joke Man” Martling
Friday, April 23

Music
Tribute to Tower of Power, Steely Dan, and more with Uppercut
Saturday, April 24 at 7:30pm

More music (Beatles! Our specialty!)
Beatles Love Songs with Gathering Time
Sunday, April 25 at 2pm

Show 1: On Sunday afternoon, DHPAC presented “South Shore Syncopators, featuring Holly Sickinger”. For this show, we have a FaceBook report from some of the band members:

A really SPECTACULAR show. The band has come a long way since it was first formed in 2007 and the singers ROCKED. There were so many felicities of detail throughout the show – Holly’s “WHAT A LITTLE MOONLIGHT”, Stephanie and the band cutting loose on Progress Hornsby’s arrangement “I WANNA BE LOVED BY YOU”, Mark Sanderlin’s “BY A WATERFALL”…

And Val was particularly cute in her character on “NOBODY CARES IF I’M BLUE”as well.

Val was indeed memorable in “NOBODY CARES”. I saw a little detail most in the audience missed – Val getting herself peeved BEFORE she comes up to the microphone, really getting in character.  Singing with a bass sax is tricky – the instrument commands a lot of attention, but Val and Tim made it a true duet, each contributing to the effect of the whole. Bravo, Syncopators, bravo indeed!

Show 2: On Saturday night, Mostly Moptop celebrated a Beatles anniversary with the show “Let It Be(fore&After): A Fab Four Song Celebration”. It was a great show, and I bumped in to Moderator/Co-blogger Steve Briody in the audience. Video and then photos below:

Let It Be: A man and his album

Show 3: On Friday night, the Felipe Salles Group and vocalist Eleonora Bianchini performed “Tribute to Bossa Nova”. Felipe Salles was born in Brazil, Eleonora Bianchini was born in Italy, and the group members were from all around the world. It was an uplifting experience to hear international music, sung in several different languages. Video of a saxophone solo, and photos of the event below.

The scene from outside DHPAC on the day before Spring...Even the moon got into that Bossa Nova feeling.

The Beatles in 1964. Library of Congress collection

If you are a Long Island Beatles fan, where can you go to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of the release of “Let It Be”? Answer: Right here at DHPAC/Dix Hills Performing Arts Center at Five Towns College in Dix Hills.

On Saturday, March 20, 2010 at 7:30pm, the band Mostly Moptop will perform “Let It Be(fore& After): A Fab Four Song celebration“  During the second set, the band will perform the entire “Let It Be” album. The show will be both a lively, and a studious, tribute to the album “Let It Be”. One of the performers is Five Towns College Professor Paul Michael Barkan, who did his PhD thesis on Beatles’ techniques. And, the show is co-presented with The John Lennon Center for Music & Technology.

Wikipedia has an entire entry on the “Let It Be” album. Here are some of the music history facts from Wikipedia: “Let It Be” is the twelfth and final studio album released by The Beatles. “Let It Be” was released on 8 May 1970, by the Apple Records label shortly after the group’s announced breakup. It acts as a soundtrack album for “Let It Be”, the motion picture, also released in 1970.

Here is a list of the songs on the “Let It Be” album, to be performed by Mostly Moptop:

1.    Two of Us
2.    Dig a Pony
3.    Across the Universe
4.    I Me Mine
5.    Dig It
6.    Let It Be
7.    Maggie Mae
8.    I’ve Got a Feeling
9.    One After 909
10.    Long and Winding Road
11.    For You Blue
12.    Get Back

_______________________________

More info on the Mostly Moptop Show:

Tickets: $25
The Box Office phone is: (631) 656-2148
Or, buy tickets online at: dhpac.org

Mostly Moptop

List of band members: John Tabacco, Anthony Pomes, Edward Franz, and Paul Michael Barkan, plus additional guest musicians.

Related story by DHPAC blogger Steve Briody:

http://blog.dhpac.org/2010/03/04/dont-miss-beatles-tribute-march-20th/

Related story with background info on the band and the show:

http://blog.dhpac.org/2010/02/26/celebrate-the-beatles-mostly-moptop-on-march-20-2010/

I am very much looking forward to attending DHPAC’s Beatles “Let It Be – 40th Anniversary” Tribute. I was going to do the standard proverbial interview with good friend Paul Barkan of the popular Beatles tribute band Mostly Moptop for their upcoming show at Dix Hills Performing Arts Center on Sat., March 20 at 7:30pm ET. However, when speaking to all the band members, I noticed they had some particularly clever interview material consisting of a “written conversation” between the band members. I think you’ll enjoy their Beatles references…hopefully you’ll do a better job of catching them all than I did!

Below the interview, I have posted footage of Moptop’s rhythm guitarist Anthony Pomes explaining how he plays the slide part from George Harrison’s “For You Blue” on the LET IT BE album with . . . a 9-volt battery? (See video attached to this blog – I was fascinated about this.). It’s a terrific “behind the scenes” segment.

I HOPE TO SEE YOU AT THE SHOW. I say “Hello” . . . and “Good-bye.” Here’s what I was given:

Secret Mostly Moptop Conversation #45…

Anthony Pomes (A) – Hey, fellas, Let it be is 40 this year

Eddie Franz (E) – Let it be known, gentle folks

John Tabacco (J) – Life begins at 40, they say.

Paul Michael Barkan (P) – Hey, why don’t we structure a show around this?

A – I was thinking the same thing – we could call it Let It Be(Fore) . . .

E – You mean like Fab Four . . .

A – No, Sir Edward, I mean like “Before and After” – like before I became Fat Elvis, you remember

J – I remember those days – you were much lighter on those fretboards…

P – But there must of course be horn parts and strings and the like?

E – I like horns – especially in my car –beep beep, beep beep yeah!

A – OK, Eddie, yes, we’ll perform DRIVE MY CAR

J – And what about FOR NO ONE?

P – Well, we hope we don’t end up playing for NO one . . .

A – Me, too, although I’m told we’ve already sold 51 percent of the house – and we haven’t even started rehearsing yet.

P – I me mine oh my, that’s confidence, lad!

A – Yes, they love us yeah yeah yeah at the Lennon Center.

J – But what else – what are you after with the “after”?

E – You were going to tell us “before”…

A – Give me a chance – and some peace – I’ve got it, let’s structure a show around the different songwriting styles and evolutions of those five young men from –

P – Five?

A – Yes, don’t you remember Stig?

J – Uh oh, he’s getting referential again!

E – You know, these rehearsals are starting to feel like plays…

P – “If music be the food of love . . .”

A – “Play on!”

J – Didn’t the Captain & Tenille write that?

E – No, it was Roy Clark.

P – How darest thou defile the almighty Bard?

A – It Don’t Come Easy, y’know?

E – Maybe I’m Amazed . . .

J – WHAT IS LIFE?!

P – Instant Sanka’s gonna drink ya!

A – But back to the point . . .

J – Hey, Harry Nilsson wrote a musical called that…

A – Yeah, he knew Lennon pretty darn well – they was just a bunch of pussy cats back then.

E – Why don’t we just play what sounds good?

A – You mean like “She Loves You”?

P – And “Things We Said Today”?

J – And “Yesterday”?

E – And “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”?

A – Help! It’s all too much – let’s just agree that the show will take us and the audience through the sound and the fury of Beatles songmaking . . .

P – And wrongwaking . . .

E – And strongtaking . . .

J – And longraking . . .

A – Yes, as in “The Long & Winding Road,” which will be the emotional center of the entire show, which will be exactly 999 minutes long . . .

J – Whoa, too long, how about 909?

A – Yes, we’ll play that too – but only one after . . .

E – And not a second time . . .

P – But we will play that too because there will be other musicians…

A – Yes, let’s bring five other people into the group because then we’ll be number nine number nine number nine . . .

J – Hey, Paul, that’s significant . . .

P – That it is, Johnny, that it is . . . numbers mean everything.

E – Especially loud ones . . .

A – And fast ones . . .

J – And good ones . . .

P – And FOR NO ONE – it’s all settled, Mostly Moptop will play at Dix Hills Performing Arts Center at Five Towns College on Saturday, March 20, starting at 7:30pm ET . . . $25 a seat.

A – Yes, and since so many people love The Beatles, this sincere endeavor of music and word and magic will be a wonderful way to start the first day of spring . . .

J – Let it be as warmly received as it was woozily conceived . . .

E – Like a newborn baby . . .

ALL FOUR in unison – Yes yes yes . . .

*****

And, over at the studio, Kbudna and the video team are creating awesome, polished versions of the performances that go on at DHPAC. There is just so much good stuff that happens here. So, our main Youtube site — DHPAC On Stage — is an artistic, video library of jazz, rock, choral works, Beatles songs, profound John Lennon homages, and a little theater sprinkled in.

A Feast of Video from DHPAC On Stage at youtube

Empty Garden (Hey, Hey, Johnny)
with Joe Kuhl [piano] and Jim Del [drums] on vocals
This is the song that Elton John wrote to mourn the loss of John Lennon

Jerry Saulter and Michelle LaPorte
guitar and flute
from their performance “Serenade: Tangos & Sambas”

Evening of Jazz 2009
(Includes scenes of Felipe Salles conducting band)

A Day in the Life (I heard the news today)
from 10/17/2009 “John Lennon A Day in the Life” birthday celebration at DHPAC
presented by The John Lennon Center for Music & Technology
produced by Joe Kuhl and Larry Brittain
multimedia images directed by Karoline Budna

Imagine
“John Lennon A Day in the Life” birthday celebration
10/17/2009
Joe Kuhl on lead vocals
Larry Brittain on acoustic guitar

Norwegian Wood
“John Lennon A Day in the Life” birthday celebration
10/17/2009

DHPAC/Dix Hills Performing Arts Center and The John Lennon Center for Music & Technology present Long Island’s top, Beatles tribute band…

Mostly Moptop: “Let It Be(fore & After)”

This premiere program marks the 40th Anniversary of Let It Be, as Mostly Moptop performs “Wake-Up” to “Break-Up” to “Make-Up” in buoyant song celebration. In 1970, the Beatles released their final studio album, Let It Be. In 2010, on Saturday, March 20 at 7:30 p.m, you can relive the experience with musicians devoted to the cause, and masterful at recreating the sounds of the Beatles.

The band is comprised of John Tabacco–also, a favorite host on WUSB radio (drums, piano, and vocals); Anthony Pomes (rhythm and lead guitar, bass, piano and vocals); Edward Franz (lead and rhythm guitar, bass, and vocals); Paul Michael Barkan (bass, keyboards, miscellaneous instruments, vocals). Barkan, a Professor of Recording at Five Towns College, wrote his PhD thesis on techniques the Beatles employed on their Magical Mystery Tour album.

The show will see Mostly Moptop performing not only key songs in the
development of each Beatles’ course as singers and writers, but also doing a
special live “track by track” 40th-anniversary recreation of the Let It Be album (released along with the film originally on May 8, 1970).

Far from being just the last Beatles album before the band broke up that year, Mostly Moptop band member Anthony Pomes feels the Let It Be album played a pivotal role in the growth and evolution of the four artists who comprised the “Fab Four.”

“It is my feeling,” says Pomes, “now that decades have gone by and we have lost both John Lennon and George Harrison, that there’s a rich tapestry of
relationship, camaraderie, communication, and love that continues to spring from the music of The Beatles. We will show in our performance that the band was still cosmically and musically ‘together’ even in the immediate months following the breakup.”

“We hope to show the audience,” he continues, “that even though separated in name, these four young men from Liverpool continued on together in spirit and especially in the music — something that, through the combined commitment of The John Lennon Center for Music & Technology and the continued evolution of Apple Records Ltd., still brings the finer messages of Beatles music into sharp and wondrous focus.”

Mostly Moptop will perform two sets. The first will convey the great “Wake Up!” of Beatlemania and the songwriting trajectories exemplified by Lennon alongside Paul McCartney, with the emergence of both George Harrison and Ringo Starr in both the songwriting and the singing of favorite Beatles songs.

Set Two will not only include the entire Let It Be album—so often associated with the creative friction inside The Beatles before the “break-up” of 1970—but also with a “Make-Up” medley of songs that the solo Beatles did in the early ’70s, after their split.

Joined in the show’s big finale by five additional musicians, Mostly Moptop hopes to show what has really come true after all these years—that even when broken up on paper, the music and soul of The Beatles always continued to entwine and dance together amongst the members of the group themselves.

For Pomes,  “It doesn’t even feel to me now like The Beatles ever broke up in any final and lasting way—both time and conceptual devotion seems to have all but rubbed it away.”

Since 1995, Mostly Moptop has been playing Beatles music and other rock ’n roll covers from the 1960s to ’80s. Mostly Moptop performed with The Beatles’ Magical Orchestra conducted by noted American composer David Amram. They have played in many NY area venues, and are always sure to bring a smile to the audiences’ faces with there faithful renditions of Beatles favorites as well as some solo work recorded by the Fab Four after the band broke up in 1970.

DHPAC/Dix Hills Performing Arts Center is located at Five Towns College. 305 North Service Road, Dix Hills, New York, 11746-5857. Tickets to this Long Island music event are $25. You can reach the Box Office at (631) 656-2148 or visit online at www.dhpac.org