Wednesday night at the Dakota Tavern there were two Debauchery at The Dakota shows from Opera Revue and various more or less scantily clad friends. We caught the early show. It was a BDSM show (Bizet, Donizetti, Saint-Saëns, Mozart… what were you thinking?). Actually this iteration probably stayed more operatic than previous Debaucheries though there were also plenty of show tune, cabaret and even comedy rock numbers plus, of course, burlesque.
So on a grungy corner of Dundas and Ossington lies a grungy cellar dive; the Dakota Tavern. It’s not an obvious place to do opera though a mash up of opera and burlesque is more plausible. And so that’s what we got from the Opera Revue crew (Alexander Hajek, Danie Friesen and Claire Harris) and four burlesque dancers.
The music was appropriately chosen; some Phantom, Don Giovanni, Carmen, some Weill plus show tunes. Basically mine the repertory for stuff that is a bit edgy and plays with ideas of sexual consent or lack of it. Ironically the goody bag that was raffled off at the interval include, apparently, an Armadildo. I say ironically because I had spent my lunchtime with the cast and crew of Colleen Wagner’s new play Armadillos which is also (at least in part) about sexual consent or lack of it. Continue reading
What better way to celebrate Kurt Weill’s birthday than listening to his songs, cabaret style, with a beer or three. Well that’s what we did on Saturday as Blitzkrieg Cabaret opened a new run of Saturday afternoon shows at the Dakota Tavern.
We got three singers; Danie Friesen, Hilary June Hart, Jackson Welchner supported by Nick Donovan (drums), Colin Frotten (piano), and Andrew Downing (bass) with Hilary also chipping in on the accordion on occasion. While Danie is a classically trained singer, Hilary and Jackson sound more comfortable in a jazzier idiom. That, plus the make up of the band meant that the show tended to the “Sinatraesque” version of Weill rather than, say, the grittiness of Pabst’s Dreigroschenoper movie. This was reflected in both choice of translation and performing style. I think this works for some of Weill’s stuff but it doesn’t work for me so well with the Brecht lyrics. I’ll go for Marx over McCarthy anytime! Other people may feel differently.
operaramblings 