Sibling Revelry
What? You haven't heard of the Callaways?
Who is Ann Hampton Callaway? She is a singer, pianist, composer, lyricist, arranger, actress, and educator. She has composed over 250 songs for television, Broadway, and off-Broadway. Her music and lyrics have been performed and recorded by Barbra Streisand, Liza Minnelli, Patti Lupone, Micheal Feinstein, Blossom Dearie, Peter Nero, Karrin Allyson, Donna McKechnie, Harvey Fierstein, Lillias White, Barbara Carroll, Amanda McBroom, Liz Callaway, and Carole King.
Who is LIz Callaway? She is a Broadway star. She has been in many shows (starring in most), including Merrily We Roll Along, Baby, The Three Musketeers, Miss Saigon, Cats, The Look of Love, The Spitfire Grill, No Way to Treat a Lady, Marry Me a Little, Godspell, and Brownstone. In movies, she has provided the singing voice for the title character in Anastasia, Princess Jasmine in Disney's The Return of Jafar, and Aladdin and the King of Thieves. Other film work includes the singing voice of the title character in The Swan Princess, Lion King 2, Beauty and the Beast, and The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars.
Why do I care? For a "birthday surprise" I was taken to see Sibling Revelry, a show created and performed by these two sisters.
The show was absolutely incredible. Their voices were absolutely amazing, and just in case their sheer skill wasn't enough to make me feel bad about my own attempts at singing, they made their incredibly difficult feats of vocal acrobatics seem completely effortless.
In case you get a chance to see it, I don't want to spoil the show for you, but I think I can give you a sense of what it was like. The show was held together by the (acted) sibling rivalry of these two sisters, which came through in the songs themselves, the "skits" between the songs, and what happened during the songs. For example, during one of Ann's solos, Liz snuck off stage, and by the end of the song, was in the audience, noisily trying to sell her personal cd's. Ann countered this by "finding" her 14 Manhattan Association of Caberets and Clubs awards on stage. In the song that followed, both sisters kept interrupting as they thought of things that they had done that made them better than their sister. "Poor Annie, you'll never know what it's like to star in 6 Broadway musicals."
It was absolutely hilarious, and the show continued to sneak in that theme, intertwined with amazing solos and duets (accompanied by a small yet incredible band of musicians). Both sisters were incredibly sharp and witty.
One of the highlights of the show was when Liz sang her favorite Broadway song, which just happens to be my favorite song, period. Other songs came from other musicals, whether famous Broadway ones or obscure (but still really good) off-Broadway. A few songs seemed to be written specifically for them, or perhaps were arranged specifically for the show.
Another highlight came at the very end of the show. They told us that when they had decided to write the show, they had gotten about 100 suggestions from friends and family of songs that they had to do. Then they said they would perform them for us.
What followed was an amazingly complex medly of (maybe, I lost count) around 25 mostly Broadway songs, shifting in tone and style to hilarious effect. For example, they would jump from a song about sisters loving each other to "What is this feeling?" from Wicked (performed, of course, with the intense emotion required to make the song work.)
After it was over, the audience gave a standing ovation for minutes, until they came back out again and performed another full 5 minute long duet.
Sibling Revelry tours around the country. If you ever get the chance to see it, I highly recommend it.