GP: Andrew Lloyd Webber 50th Birthday Celebration


	The Songs in the Show By Michael Coveney

The birthday gala opens and closes with the title song from the latest Lloyd Webber musical, "Whistle Down the Wind." In the musical narrative, three children discover a man on the run in their country barn. They take him to be Jesus, and adopt him as their special cause in a community where religious belief is institutionalized by adults representing the church and the law.

The original novel by Mary Hayley Bell was a charming 1962 British film, starring Alan Bates and the young Hayley Mills as Swallow. Lloyd Webber and his lyricist, Jim Steinman, transposed the action to the Bible belt in Louisiana and wrote, in effect, the composer's most rock-oriented show since "Jesus Christ Superstar."


	The eldest child, Swallow, sings the title song of the show, which is given two greatly contrasting interpretations: first by Tina Arena at full belt, then quietly by Lottie Mayor at the piano with the composer himself. Elsewhere, Michael Ball and a gospel choir raise the roof with "Vaults of Heaven," the musical's opening chorus in the local church, while Bonnie Tyler re-forges her famous rock relationship with Jim Steinman, singing the motorbike anthem of youthful escape and escapade, "Tyre Tracks and Broken Hearts."



	Performer Michael Ball.

"Whistle"'s biggest hit song is "No Matter What," recorded by Boyzone, who sing it here with a sweet insouciance that sums up the show's plea for innocence and friendship: "No matter what they tell us, no matter what they do; no matter what they teach us, what we believe is true." The lyric cleverly turns on the supposition that we might hear God himself say this, if only prayers were answered, if only tears were laughter.

Back in 1968, the Lloyd Webber story started with the first school performance of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat," and that early magic is recreated by Donny Osmond, a stage full of children and balloons, and two of Lloyd Webber's most beguiling early tunes, "Any Dream Will Do" and "Close Every Door," with fresh lyrics by Tim Rice: "May I return to the beginning, the light is dimming, and the dream is too; the world and I, we are still waiting, still hesitating, any dream will do." This is the jaunty finale of the show where Joseph is reconciled with his brothers, having become a national hero.

More high spirits tumble from the "Variations," which Lloyd Webber wrote for his cello-playing brother, Julian, before the mood becomes more somber with the funeral music from "Evita" (1978). The heroine has died and the show recalls her ascent to the status of First Lady of Argentina -- first as an actress, then as the wife of President Peron and champion of the poor.



	Antonio Banderas sings from "Evita."

Antonio Banderas sings two sardonic songs of Che's, the show's narrator: in "Oh, What a Circus," he applauds the theatricality of her funereal exit; while in "High Flying Adored," one of Lloyd Webber's favorite numbers, he recalls the leader on her rise and at the peak of her fame.

But the big song, of course, here sung by the first onstage "Evita," Elaine Paige, remains "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina," in which the protagonist addresses her adoring crowds from the balcony of the Casa Rosada in Buenos Aires, ambiguously justifying her fame and apologizing for it at the same time.

The tempo becomes more frantic with the arrival of the roller-skating cast of "Starlight Express" (1984), who reiterate in the show's message that you can always win if you try hard enough and believe in yourself: "Light at the End of the Tunnel" is a paean to self-help, very different from the next great chorus, "Hosanna," from "Jesus Christ Superstar" (1972).

"Superstar" was the show that put Rice and Lloyd Webber firmly on the map, and this chorus has some of Rice's freest lyrics, evidenced by the characters celebrating the entry of Jesus to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: "Hosanna, Heysanna, Sanna Sanna Ho, Sanny Hey Sanna Ho Sanna; Hey JC, JC won't you smile at me? Sanna Ho Sanna Hey Superstar!" This is beautifully contrasted with the more somber "Hosanna" from the "Requiem" (1985) and the beautiful "Pie Jesu," which became an unexpected best-selling single release.

The second half opens with the now-familiar strains, a summoning of all cats to the "Jellicle Ball," where one of their number will be selected to pass to the Heavyside Layer.

But the meat of this portion of the concert is dedicated to songs from the two great romantic musicals that have dominated Lloyd Webber's activity in the late 1980s and 1990s: "Phantom of the Opera" (1986) and "Sunset Boulevard" (1993).

The romantic songs in the first (lyrics by Charles Hart and Richard Stilgoe) are virtually self-explanatory, as Sarah Brightman encounters the mysterious masked man of music who changes her life at the Paris Opera, here sung by Antonio Banderas, then by Michael Ball.


	In "Sunset," the orchestral sequence of the car chase brings a struggling writer to the Gothic starkness of Norma Desmond, where he will be sucked into her bizarre tragedy of melodramatic self-deception. Glenn Close, giving a stupendous performance, commands the audience to submission in the tune, "With One Look," in which she explains her power over the adoring moviegoers in the dark. Ironically, of course, she is singing about the silent movie era, using words (by Don Black and Christopher Hampton) where she claims she needed none.



	Glenn Close sings from "Sunset Boulevard."

No Lloyd Webber gala would be complete without "Memory" from "Cats," one of the most famous songs of all time (lyrics by Trevor Nunn and inspired by T. S. Eliot), and Elaine Paige, the original Grizabella, sings it to the rafters. Michael Ball then sings another popular item, "Love Changes Everything," from "Aspects of Love."

And before a quiet, downbeat finale with the composer and Lottie Mayer at the piano, we have the gorgeously regal figure of Kiri Te Kanawa singing an astonishing new song, "The Heart is Slow to Learn" (lyrics by Don Black), which sounds as if it might have been transmitted to Lloyd Webber by Puccini himself, and which may or may not appear one day in the stage sequel to "Phantom of the Opera."

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