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Cincinnati Pops Salutes Stephen Foster Splendidly

Mary Ellyn Hutton
Posted: Jan 26, 2015 - 11:59:57 AM in reviews_2015

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Stephen Collins Foster
As a songwriter, Stephen Collins Foster might be called the American Schubert.

Certainly, his legacy of over 200 songs is the foundation of the Great American Songbook.

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John Morris Russell
John Morris Russell and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, joined by an array of talent representing American roots music, paid tribute to the one-time Cincinnatian in “American Originals” Sunday afternoon at Music Hall.

The scene was “set” with a carpet, a pair of armchairs and lamps and the bust of Foster that normally resides in the north wing of Music Hall. All were placed behind Russell at the front of the stage

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Rosanne Cash
The guest list included vocalist Rosanne Cash, The Comet Bluegrass All-Stars (who perform at The Comet in Cincinnati’s Northside neighborhood), vocalists Joe Henry and Aoife Donovan, vocalist/instrumentalist Joe Flemons and Over the Rhine, a duo comprising vocalist Karen Berquist and instrumentalist Linford Detweiler (who got their start in Cincinnati, and took their name from the city’s historic downtown neighborhood).

The well-planned program included icons by Foster – “O Susannah!” “Old Folks at Home,” “Beautiful Dreamer” and of course, “My Old Kentucky Home.” There were songs by the great American composer, Anonymous, such as “Red River Valley,” “Kumbaya” and “Amazing Grace.” Guest artist Roseanne Cash represented her father Johnny Cash with his sentimental “I Still Miss Someone.” Peter Boyer’s soaring “Rolling River,” sketches on “Shenandoah” (a program highlight), reminded this listener of ”The Moldau” from Czech composer Smetana’s “Ma Vlast.”

The concert, which opened Friday and Saturday nights at Music Hall, was recorded live for an upcoming CD (the Pops’ 95th release).

The music was performed in a variety of arrangements, many by Pops guitarist/banjoist Timothy Berens. Members of the Pops rhythm section, including percussionist Marc Wolfley, bassist Matthew Zory, and Berens, were aligned behind the orchestra.

The audience got into the act at one point, as Russell taught them to hum, rub their hands together and snap their fingers -- effects which he called on in “Amazing Grace” with O’Donovan and The Comet Bluegrass All-Stars.

The program opened with the 1862 patriotic song, “Battle Cry of Freedom” by George Frederick Root, heard in a rousing, trumpet and drums arrangement by Berens that immediately galvanized the 2,000-plus audience.

It was seemingly all highlights from then on.

Among them:

Berquist’s caressing voice in Foster’s “Why, No One to Love?”

The Gullah spiritual “Kumbaya” performed by the CSO strings with percussionist Richard Jensen on the djembe (a West African drum played with bare hands).

Flemons’ soulful, jazzy “Old Folks at Home” (Foster), where he also played harmonica nimbly

Roseanne Cash in “Beautiful Dreamer”(Foster), “a lullaby for grownups,” she said, with a luscious full orchestra accompaniment delivered expertly by Russell

“Slumber My Darling” (Foster), a real lullaby, sweetly sung by O’Donovan with the Pops, featuring solos by Christopher Philpotts on English horn and principal cellist Ilya Finkelshteyn

Foster’s “Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair,” a duo by Berquist and O’Donovan with a rhythm and blues feel

the achingly beautiful “Hard Times Come Again” (Foster) by Over the Rhine with a solo by Pops violinist/concertmaster Timothy Lees

the Civil War song “Aura Lee” by George R. Poulton (appropriated by Elvin Presley in “Love Me Tender”), beautifully sung by Henry with fiddler/vocalist Ed Cunningham of the Bluegrass All-Stars

A delightful addition to the program was Foster’s “If You Only Had a Mustache,” performed and sung by the Bluegrass All-Stars, joined by Flemons.

My favorite may have been “Ring, Ring the Banjo” (Foster), where Flemons showed himself a virtuoso on bones, demonstrating incredible precision, and performing a duo with the Pops’ Joan Voorhees on piccolo. The CSO strings “picked” their instruments (holding them in their laps) and Cunningham joined in on amplified fiddle.

The encore, which had to be repeated when the audience demanded even more, was Foster’s “Camptown Races,” which brought together the entire company, including Russell on spoons. Principal trumpeter Matthew Ernst delivered a blazing solo here, and the audience could not help but clap along at the end.