Broadway Spectacular a hit in every way

Tyley Ross

A Broadway musical is only as successful as its ability to lift audiences out of their seats and send them off with a song on their lips and a smile in their hearts. No less should be expected of any pops concert devoted to the music of Broadway.

By that measure, the National Arts Centre Orchestra's Broadway Spectacular, which winds up its run tonight, is a certifiable hit. The concert features the orchestra under veteran stage-musical conductor Jack Everly, the Cantata Singers of Ottawa and four guest soloists - a fine, vibrant company that sounds so thoroughly Big Broadway you could close your eyes for a second and almost imagine yourself on the Great White Way, taking in South Pacific at the Majestic, My Fair Lady at the Mark Hellinger.

The show, with its 18 numbers ranging from Annie Get Your Gun tunes to those of Candide, has shone the feature-billing spotlight on its special guest, Tyley Ross. And who better?

The former Ottawan, Canterbury High School's star graduate, has made an impressive name for himself in stage musicals, from his award-winning performance in The Who's Tommy, to his nine months on Broadway as the romantic lead in Miss Saigon, to his dynamite turn in the Stratford Festival version of West Side Story.

The 30-year-old Ross, in other words, knows his way around a Broadway score.

And he seems only to have gotten better. With his clear, sweet tenor on the Les Misérables showstopper Bring Him Home, he really does stop the show - justifiably. And his version of Cole Porter's I Love Paris does nothing less than transport. But Ross is only one-quarter of the soloist contingent, and admiring attention is every bit as due Glenda Balkan's soprano, matinee idol Curtis Sullivan's baritone and the brassy alto of K.K. Edissi, who makes up in pizzazz what she lacks in vocal finesse. Balkan's I Could Have Danced All Night is at once whimsical and soaring, Sullivan's Some Enchanted Evening is warm and lush, Edissi's Blow, Gabriel, Blow pulses with Merman-like energy.

And the ensemble pieces - the Tonight quintet from West Side Story, a collage of Kiss Me Kate numbers - are stunning. Add the easygoing, informative patter between numbers by personable conductor Everly, and the beautifully textured tones of Laurence Ewashko's Cantata Singers, and you have all the necessary ingredients for a memorable evening at the NAC.

In a Broadway's-Greatest-Hits show like this, it is inevitable that you would quibble with the selection (why the less familiar Candide rather than, say, something from Fiddler or Show Boat?) Or you could second-guess a finale, and an encore, that are surprisingly low-key, instead of explosive. But that would be carping.

The NAC Orchestra has concluded its pops season with a concert that is musically accomplished, thoroughly entertaining and just plain fun. Which is precisely what Broadway is all about.