Musical theatre is not usually my thing but given the consistently high standard of everything at Crow’s theatre in the last couple of years I was prepared to take a punt on Dave Malloy’s Pierre, Natasha and the Great Comet of 1812 despite knowing full well it was a Broadway musical. The bottom line is I found it a very odd experience. There was plenty to like and I kind of get why people like shows like it but It’s still really not my thing but I don’t think I’m the target audience.
I really wanted to like David Warrack’s new piece Abraham that premiered last night at the Metropolitan United Church. It’s described as an oratorio and tells the story of the patriarch Abraham and uses that as a jumping off point for arguing for the breaking down of barriers between Jews, Christians and Muslims based on their shared heritage(*). Given recent events in Canada and elsewhere that’s obviously a worthy goal and the whole thing was in aid of the Metropolitan United Church Syrian Refugee Fund; reason enough, in itself, to go.
operaramblings 