The Classical Mystery Tour Beatles cover band played a show for the Sedona Symphony at the Sedona Performing Arts Center on Saturday, April 26, at which the Symphony also performed.
The orchestra had been supplemented with extra brass for the occasion — it was amazing what trombones do for the richness of the Symphony’s sound — and was also joined by the virtuoso bassist Catalin Rotaru, who previously played the Red Rocks Music Festival last fall. They opened with a lovely overture arranged from elements of Beatles compositions, particularly “Let it Be,” and additionally played a fine-grained, tremulous interlude during the second half of the concert. It was a golden beginning as they began transforming familiar musical ideas into an uplifting, textured synthesis that left listeners waiting eagerly.
Regrettably, those hints of what the Beatles’ genius might become when rendered through a full orchestra were all the audience were able to enjoy during the evening. Much of the time, the Symphony didn’t actually get the chance to play, and when it did, it was drowned out by the cranked-up amplifiers the band had thought necessary to the occasion. The noise was so loud that the band’s setup even included a perspex screen protecting the orchestra from the drummer. Behind it, Artistic Director Janna Hymes found herself in the unenviable position of spending a large portion of the evening conducting a largely silent ensemble.
The degree to which the orchestra was audible varied from not at all in “Gotta Get You Into My Life,” “Hard Day’s Night,” “All You Need Is Love,” “Penny Lane,” “Here Comes the Sun,” “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” “I Am the Walrus,” “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” “Yellow Submarine” and “Lady Madonna” to just barely in “Yesterday,” “Come Together,” “Golden Slumbers” and “Imagine,” with a hint of brass in “Magical Mystery Tour” and “The Long and Winding Road,” to moderately in “I Saw Her Standing There” — in which the orchestra provided percussion by clapping.
For “Eleanor Rigby,” the orchestra started playing before the band, giving the audience a taste of just how good they would have sounded and how effective the strings would have been at rendering the Beatles’ music could they have been heard. That was even more in evidence during “Good Night,” sung by the band’s drummer with orchestra-only accompaniment, for which the Symphony supplied a charming melody.
Classical Mystery Tour themselves put on a visually if not acoustically convincing display with costume changes, wig changes and moustache changes. “Penny Lane,” “Magical Mystery Tour” and “Yellow Submarine” were their best efforts in the midst of off-key vocals, occasionally dragging tempos and missed counts.
The real problem with the band’s act, however, apart from the sound balance, was their orchestrations, which were not Beatles’ producer George Martin’s originals, but their own recreations done in collaboration with composer Martin Herman. The resulting arrangements were sparse, empty and barren, and completely failed to convert the different voices and ideas within the Beatles’ music into instrumental lines. Much of the thrill of going to a pops concert comes from hearing all of the extra detail that emerges when pop and rock songs are expanded to fully utilize the orchestra’s capacities and express the power inherent in those popular themes. Classical Mystery Tour, on the other hand, failed to reveal or enhance anything in their source material. They merely played as loudly as they could in front of a silenced orchestra, and noise is noise, whether it’s Bruckner or badly-done Beatles.
But then, Classical Mystery Tour’s performance was more about showmanship and nostalgia than music. The line “Do you remember records?” from the band got a good laugh, as did the comment, “Have we got anyone who remembers the ’60s? If you can remember the ’60s, you probably weren’t really there.” Some of the audience turned out in Beatles costumes, and there was dancing in the aisles for the “Twist and Shout” at the end.
The Symphony will return for its 21st season on Oct. 19, when it will feature as its guest artist Van Cliburn-winning pianist Jon Nakamatsu in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1. The full lineup for next season will be announced on May 22 and is expected to include Ferde Grofe’s “Grand Canyon Suite” as well.
