WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

#1

WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:21pm

From a new press release today

https://www.broadwayworld.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=30043

This production, with an onstage cast of 37 and 30 musicians in the orchestra pit, will introduce the unprecedented element of selectively weaving Spanish throughout both the book and songs.

And it looks like some of the lyrics WILL be sung in Spanish. But great news for the orchestra. Not sure if that was known already. But 30 players is fantastic.

#2

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:24pm

Ooh, fantastic!!
Thanks!

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"As we all should probably have learned by now, to be a Stephen Sondheim fan is to have one's heart broken at regular intervals" - Frank Rich

Dearest, how can this be so? You were dead, you know. - Candide

Oh my god, this show has everything! Half naked guys and girl on girl action! - [title of show]

(My avatar? Why, yes! That is Laura Benanti making out with a chick!)

#3

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:25pm

Words cannot express.

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"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum

#4

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:29pm

So many of these damn shows lately have a measly five piece band that pales in comparison to the huge orchestras of old. This is fabulous news.

#5

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:31pm

! ! ! ! ! !

i just peed my pants!

#6

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:33pm

Unless the show is a disaster, I'll have to see this just for the orchestra.

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I am a firm believer in serendipity- all the random pieces coming together in one wonderful moment, when suddenly you see what their purpose was all along.

#7

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:34pm

This is going to be a HUGE production. It really does belong in The Palace.

#8

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:42pm

THANK GOD! The score couldn't be played any other way.

They probably did away with one or both viola parts written for the 2 viola players who came to the theater who Bernstein didn't think were good enough, so he wrote easy parts for them.

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"If there was a Mount Rushmore for Broadway scores, "West Side Story" would be front and center. It snaps, it crackles it pops! It surges with a roar, its energy and sheer life undiminished by the years" - NYPost reviewer Elisabeth Vincentelli

#9

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:43pm

Found this instrumentation posted online. Adds up to 30. I wonder if this is correct?

5 woodwind
2 horn
3 trumpet
2 trombone
1 drums
2 percussion
1 piano
1 guitar
7 violin
4 cello
2 double bass

#10

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:45pm

But will I have to bring an interpreter to understand the dialogue?

#11

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:46pm

Did you need an interpreter for THE LIGHT IN THE PIAZZA?

#12

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:48pm

Maybe they will use supertitles, like at the opera!

Or maybe they assume everyone knows the story and the lyrics by hears already.

#13

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:48pm

Did you need an interpreter for THE LIGHT IN THE PIAZZA?

I <3 Ljay.

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"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"

Updated On: 7/16/08 at 01:48 PM

#14

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:49pm

Get a dictionary and look up "tongue in cheek".

#15

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:49pm

I always love a big orchestra.

#16

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:50pm

This bilingual thing is his "big concept"? Boring!

#17

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:50pm

tongue-in-cheek (tngn-chk)
adj.
Meant or expressed ironically or facetiously.

#18

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 1:57pm

I'm actually excited for this now, if they will cast people who can sing the parts well.

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Jimmy, what are you doing here in the middle of the night? It's almost 9 PM!

#19

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:08pm

I couldn't be more excited... I WILL make a trip to NYC just for this. It's been my very favorite Broadway musical since birth, essentially, and to finally get the chance to see a production of it on Broadway is a dream. 30-piece orchestra!! OY!

(I'm currently doing a community theatre production of the show in Alameda, California... That's ramping me up that much more to be there next spring!)

#20

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:12pm

"This show will be radically different from any other production of WEST SIDE STORY ever done. The musical theatre and cultural conventions of 1957 made it next to impossible for the characters to have authenticity. Every member of both gangs was always a potential killer even then. Now they actually will be. Only Tony and Maria try to live in a different world" said Arthur Laurents, who was recently nominated for a 2008 Tony Award for his direction of GYPSY, also one of his librettos.

This production, with an onstage cast of 37 and 30 musicians in the orchestra pit, will introduce the unprecedented element of selectively weaving Spanish throughout both the book and songs.

Great News! I hope they cast REAL Puerto Ricans or hispanics, and I should have no complains at all!

J*

Updated On: 7/16/08 at 02:12 PM

#21

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:20pm

Updated On: 8/5/13 at 02:20 PM

#22

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:20pm

How exciting!!!

I vote for Eden Espinosa or Karen Olivo!!

#23

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:22pm

There was that production I saw a few years back at Stratford, Ontario which had an Asian Maria and very petite, extremely effeminate Tony. Now THAT was ground-breaking.

#24

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:22pm

"unprecedented element of selectively weaving Spanish throughout both the book and songs."

Didn't In The Heights do that already?

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"Chicago is it's own incredible theater town right there smack down in the middle of the heartland. What a great city! I can see why Oprah likes to live there!" - Dee Hoty :-D

#25

re: WEST SIDE STORY Revival will have an Orchestra of 30 players...

Posted: 7/16/08 at 2:23pm

There was that production I saw a few years back at Stratford, Ontario which had an Asian Maria and very petite, extremely effeminate Tony. Now THAT was ground-breaking.

- Are you being tongue in cheek?



Chinkie - I think they mean this will be the first production of WSS to do this.