As the fourth and culminating year of their new BW Beatles Festival, Baldwin Wallace University students spent the past year rehearing a note-for-note recreation of “The Beatles,” the 1968 masterpiece known as “The White Album,” and performed it for standing-room only crowds on Fri 3/28 at Fynette Kulas as a preview for students, and on Sat 3/29 at the John Patrick Theatre for the general public. Just before curtain, there were over 40 people waiting in the lobby for a spare seat. The atmosphere was electric.
Completely directed by students, and led by seniors Patrick Hyzy (vocals, piano, mandolin, accordion & guitar) and Jesse Hodgson (guitars, trumpet, conductor), over 55 students and faculty performed detailed arrangements that Hyzy started in the summer of 2013 as a participant in BW’s prestigious Summer Scholars program, and which included tape loops, synthesizer patches, bass, guitars, drums and a full complement of string orchestra, brass and woodwinds, when necessary. Next year, they repeat the 4-LP cycle starting with Abbey Road.
Cool Cleveland attended both evenings, and captured 10 short clips. Choreographer/dancers Rachel Reszler and Cleo DeOrio created a moody, sensuous movement piece during Revolution 9 on Saturday’s proscenium performance. All the remaining clips are from Friday’s preview at the newly renovated Fynette Kulas Hall, formerly a church sanctuary.
View the video interview with Hyzy and Hodgson here. Mulready presented “(secrets of the white album)”, a multi-media presentation on the stories behind The Beatles’ White Album, o n Wed 3/19 at Gamble Auditorium on the BW campus here.
http://www.bw.edu/news/thewhitealbum/
Back In The U.S.S.R. and Dear Prudence
Bungalow Bill and While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except for Me and My Monkey