NELO Wraps Up Its Biggest Season Ever!

With 4 productions, 2 world premieres, and performances in 12 towns, this was our biggest year yet!  The season got started with a bang last summer with our Summer Concert Series. The six week series had the best, most varied concerts we’ve had to date. Many thanks to the 40+ performers who donated their time and talent for the series (our major fundraiser of the year.) We can’t wait to see/hear this year’s!

Our sixth season featured two brand new shows created by NELO Artistic Director Mark  Morgan. The first, our major production of the year, was Yes, Yes, Jeanette! A Musical Fantasy on Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. This full production starred Jean Danton (Jeanette), Sara Ann Mitchell (Screen Jeanette) and Mark Morgan (Nelson Eddy), and was directed by NELO regular Peter A Carey. Using a 1957 interview that Jeanette and her husband Gene Raymond did with Edward R Murrow for CBS’s Person to Person show, Yes, Yes, Jeanette traced Jeanette’s career and her screen partnership with Nelson Eddy. Musical numbers from many of their films were recreated including Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life, Indian Love Call, and Wanting You. The show received great acclaim from audiences and critics alike. After the closing performance we were treated to a talkback session between the audience, show creator Mark Morgan, and MacDonald scholar Edward Baron Turk.

The second premiere of the year, The Roaring 20’s, was a new musical revue set in Boston’s (now demolished) Gaiety Theatre.  With songs, stories, and vaudeville sketches, The Roaring 20’s traced the arc of this tumultuous decade. The expert cast included NELO regular Brian De Lorenzo, along with newcomers Liane Grasso and Valeska Cambron. The show was directed by Michael Byrne. It was received enthusiastically in 7 different towns and will be made available for touring next season.

Our sixth season also featured tours of two of our popular revue shows: Night and Day: A Cole Porter Celebration and Fascinatin’ Rhythm: A George Gershwin Revue. The shows played theaters and churches throughout the area, with a sold out performances at The Firehouse Center for the Arts in Newburyport and the West End Theatre in Gloucester.

NELO Celebrates 5th Season with Gilbert, Sullivan, and Gershwin, and Kern

NELO marked its 5th birthday this past season with premieres of two new production and the long awaited return of our Jerome Kern revue, Night and Day. Having produced “staged concerts” for our main production each year, it also marked the first time we moved to a full production with a beautiful light plot by Caleb Magoun, and wonderful costumes by Leah Canali. The Gilbert and Sullivan Radio Hour featured two one act pieces by the famous duo-each written without the other! Set as a live radio show in the 1940’s during the war, the evening started with Sullivan’s hilarious Cox and Box. The second act included Gilbert’s Happy Arcadia. The music to this has long been lost, but we were pleased to present a version using lesser known Sullivan music in an edition prepared by Jonathan Strong. The show was directed by longtime NELO collaborator Peter A Carey and featured an wonderful cast including Brad Fugate, Teresa Blume, Marya Danihel, Greg Zavracky, Jim Jordan, Daniel Kamalic, and was accompanied on stage by Eric Schwarz.

The season continued with the premiere of our new revue in our Great American Songbook Series: Fascinatin’ Rhythm. Directed by Michael Byrne, the cast of June Baboian, Mark Morgan, Michael Ricca, and Kaja Schuppert took us on a musical tour through some of the best loved songs in all of American music. With Markus Hauck at the piano, the audience was treated to standards like I Got Rhythm, Love Is here To Stay, Summertime, and Nice Work if You Can Get It, as well as rarer pieces like South Sea Isles. The show has now joined our line up of touring shows and makes a return visit this fall!

A Summer of Song

NELO’s 5th Annual Summer Concert Series included some of the best programs to date for this audience favorite. The Cabaret Show featured some top notch talent from the Boston area scene including Leigh Barrett, Brian De Lorenzo, and Michael Ricca. Each of the weekly concerts (Broadway, opera, G & S , etc.) had a wonderful array of music and performers. Over 40 professional singers joined us for the series this year. The summer was rounded out by our 4th annual Rising stars program for high school students.