#4: Jesus Christ Superstar - 2005 Live at Etablissemant Ronacher Theatre
Jesus Christ Superstar - 2005 Live at Etablissemant Ronacher Theatre
Released: 2005
Vocalists:
Jesus - Drew Sarich
Judas - Serkan Kaya
Caiaphas - Dennis Kozeluh
Simon/Annas - Rob Fowler
Pilate - André Bauer
Peter - Roman Straka
Mary Magdalene - Claudia Stangl
Herod - Jacqueline Braun
Soulgirls - Tina Schöltzke, Wietske van Tongeren
Musicians:
Flute - Alexander Wagendristel, Johann Pichler
Reeds - Karl Korak, Thomas Faulhammer
Oboe - Vasile Marian
Horn - Andrej Kasijan, Franz Pickl
Trumpet - Gerald Pfister, Wilhellm Poisinger, Aneel Soomary
Trombone - Alois Kampichler, Dietmar Florin, Cyriak Jäger
Keyboards - Wolfgang Gattringer, Tomislav Benic
Guitar - Harry Peller, Wilfried Modik
Bass Guitar - Heinz Jäger
Percussion - Franz Steiner
Drums - Klaus Pérez-Salado
Violin - Andrea Hanh-Bucz, Gürcan Tüyel, Renate Eisner, Wolfgang Faast, Hi-Sook Heurix, Manfred Kammerhofer, Konrad Krattenthaler, Laszlo Miklos
Viola - Cordelia Kirchmayr, Susanna Tautscher
Cello - Maria Frodl, Elisabeth Taschner
Double Bass - Karl Kummer
Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lyrics by Tim Rice.
Track listing:
Overture
Heaven on Their Minds
What’s the Buzz?
Strange Thing Mystifying
Everything’s Alright
This Jesus Must Die!
Hosanna
Simon Zealotes/Poor Jerusalem
Pilate’s Dream
The Temple
I Don’t Know How to Love Him
Damned for All Time/Blood Money
The Last Supper
I Only Want to Say/Gethsemane
Pilate and Christ
King Herod’s Song
Could We Start Again, Please
Judas’ Death
Trial Before Pilate
Superstar
John Nineteen Forty-One
Thirteen years ago, a YouTuber by the name of Sillivrina uploaded a video that came across my recommended videos. It was a video of my favorite song from, arguably, my favorite show of all time, Jesus Christ Superstar. I say arguably because I can never definitively say what my favorite show is without my brain going, “Ok but what about *insert whatever show*.”
It was a video of Heaven on Their Minds sung by Drew Sarich from a 2005 production in Amstetten. My obsession with JCS was pretty damned high at the time. So obviously I watched. The production was huge. The stage looked like a portion was covered in sand. Jesus sported long blonde hair and Judas, this…Drew Sarich, had a shaved head, was shirtless with an odd red robe like thing. He started singing. I was enamored immediately. The vocals came out like they were nothing. But his cynicism was aggressively coming out. There were so many varied emotions coming out from the first “Jesus!”
Then…he started REALLY playing with the melody. Now…for anybody who’s a real fan of the show. There’s no set vocal melodies. Not a single person has ever sung that score straight.
Except for maybe this guy.
And while yes, he’s got a nice voice…it sucks. A lot.
Now…these melodic alterations were fascinating. They didn’t feel like embellishments. They felt like true alternate melodic routes. Not to mention…his voice carried them easily. Then…the orchestrations. The strings were carrying this incredible melody that I had never heard before. Super complimentary.
There’s gotta be more. And yes…there was. The full show was up on YouTube in scattered pieces. I searched and eventually was able to watch the entire thing. Now it was around this time that I realized…this is a professionally shot video. So…naturally there HAD to be a cast album.
No such luck. Apparently this was a professional video shot for posterity. Odd, considering there were multiple camera angles and the sound quality was bitchin’. Alas…I was stuck. I did what any nerd would do…downloaded an app that allowed me to rip the music right from the videos and made my own cast album.
Thus began my obsession with JCS bootlegs.
Before my hard drive crash in 2014, I had amassed a total of 318 bootlegs. I had listened to all of them and knew them VERY well. To the point where even to this day I could tell you from hearing only a small portion where it was, when it was, who’s in it, and even give you some info on the riffs done and orchestral changes.
Yes…that is all very true. I promise there isn’t an album of JCS I haven’t heard. Go for it and test me.
Now…Drew Sarich became a separate obsession. He also happened to be in the 2006 Les Mis revival that me and my friend Steve went to many many times. He played Grantaire and understudied Valjean, Enjolras & Javert. Taking over for Valjean for a short while.
I met him…got an awkward picture with him and everything. But I really started digging into what his deal was.
Drew was an American actor who went to school in Boston Conservatory (actually was an upperclassman when one of the actors I knew from a local theater was there) and had done a few shows around New York. One was a production of JCS in Nyack where he played Judas opposite Billy Porter as Jesus. Fun Fact: Constantine Maroulis was his understudy. This is supported by the fact that when Constantine sings “Heaven on their Minds” he bogarts a few of Drew’s riffs from the Nyack production.
In 1999 he was awarded the part of Quasimodo in Disney’s stage adaption of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”
…
in Berlin.
So Drew, not speaking German at the time, had to learn the score phonetically. Take a listen to that album…he’s quite good! So somewhere around here he began doing productions in and around Germany. He played Berger in “Hair,” Cousin Kevin in “The Who’s Tommy,” Hedwig in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” and so on and so forth. Somewhere around this time he met Ann Mandrella, his wife. Drew definitely became comfortable in Europe.
So anyway. The discovery of him in “Hair" immediately sparked interest for me. I love “Hair.” Quite a bit. And…THERE WAS A CAST ALBUM. I went to buy it immediately. But wait…recommended…an album of Jesus Christ Superstar I’ve never seen or heard. It’s just a giant picture of a hand with a nail in it. …badass.
AND DREW WAS IN IT. It had to be the one! So…added to the cart and bought.
Weeks later, (it WAS shipping from Germany), the albums arrive. JCS is first.
I throw it on.
The overture sounds great. The drums are a bit weak for my taste…but what can ya do.
Heaven on their minds starts. But…it sounds different than the one in the video.
“My mind is clearer now…”
Wait…that’s…not Drew.
I quickly look at the liner notes. Yup…
Judas - Serkan Kaya
Jesus - Drew Sarich
There was no time for disappointment…as I was about to hear him as Jesus.
But that was completely wiped from my mind…as Judas slides up from what is usually an A on the word “Jesus” to a D natural.
My mind is blown. Then…I’m confused as after each line…he loudly inhales. It doesn’t exactly sound like he’s taking a breath. It sounds like he’s sucking in air. That’s the only way I can describe it. It’s odd.
His accent is getting a bit in the way of the words…but his performance is fascinating nonetheless.
The song ends. An audience cheers. It’s a live album…
Again…very unexpected.
Then “What’s the Buzz” begins. It’s slow. A good slow. The groove is deep. One of the guitars is playing around with some wah wah fills. I love it.
“Why should you want to know…”
Drew’s voice sounds incredible. Immediately I’m converted. He’s meant to play Jesus. Hands down. He starts playing with the melody just as he did with Judas. It all feels so right. So perfect.
Now…I could go on and on about the full album and give you a play by play of each track. But It’s better if you listen yourself. It’s on Apple Music.
Hands down this is my favorite version of Gethsemane. It’s raw. It’s ANGRY. Gethsemane is an angry song. And so very rarely is played as such. It’s generally done with this melodrama. It works. But I think it’s a real disservice to the lyric. They also ditch that second ending that Andrew Lloyd Webber added in 1996. Fantastic.
There’s a number of recordings of Drew singing Gethsemane. The one on this album is by far the best.
The other thing that struck me in this album is during the trial.
During the lashing sequence. The actor playing Pilate general counts out the 39 lashes in time. It’s a treat for any actor to make those 39 measures build. The better that actor…the more brutal it is to watch Pilate vs Jesus actually getting whipped.
During this production, however, the lashes stop after about 5 and Pilate goes into a large monologue in silence. I asked someone, once, that spoke German what he was saying. It turns out, he’s reciting the verse in the Bible where Pilate condemns Jesus and washes his hands of it.
This is a hell of a bold choice. A HELL of a bold choice.
German theater tends to be full of choices like that. There’s no doubt in my mind that Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice hate this. And they have every right to…it’s their work. And it should be done how they want.
Andrew actually was so upset with a production in the early nineties that he stopped them from being able to release a video recording of the show. It aired only once. I can’t honestly blame him…because again it’s HIS work.
That being said…how can the show grow if people are not allowed to play in the sand more though?
If we’re stuck putting on the exact same show all the time…why put it on at all? Work should have the right to be interpreted by who helms it. West Side Story’s current revival is brilliant. It is. Let’s put a pin in that controversy for now and look at the direction. We all know West Side Story. I love the show. But if a revival came about…and was Jerome Robbins’ choreography yet again. Why? Theater is not film. It’s not meant to be a recorded frozen piece of time. It’s meant to breathe. The removal of I Feel Pretty and the Somewhere ballet is a bold move. And honestly…it works in the context of how he directed the piece. I Feel Pretty would have stopped the show dead. The Somewhere ballet would’ve been redundant. Somewhere did all that was needed. Now even if it didn’t work…I was stoked to see it. I was aching to know what a West Side Story without one of the most well known songs was to be. They asked for permission to do this. The estate and living writers gave the permission.
Instead of judging it prior…give it the chance. See if it works. Maybe you think I Feel Pretty would still have worked and served it’s original purpose. Who knows? My point is, theater needs this. It needs bold moves. Revivals are only interesting when something is done with them.
I think, musically, Andrew has gotten quite uptight about his shows. You won’t hear a version of JCS like on this album. The current 50th anniversary tour is quite wonderful. The performers do sing the hell out of it and the staging is REALLY interesting. The band is the right kind of loud. It’s doing everything right. But I wouldn’t call the music adventurous. If it was, I’m sure Andrew wouldn’t have given the ok for a tour. Is this a bad thing? Not necessarily. Some of the things on this album absolutely do NOT work. And if you’re gonna go for a long running piece…maybe that’s not the best choice. But I really love to see and hear things more along those lines.
This blog is kinda exemplary about what I’m talking (or…rambling) about. It’s changing with each album. This was not the emotional journey some of the past entries were. Not so much about my past…as much as about my thoughts. Is that a good thing? In terms of keeping readers…who knows. This was quite stream of conscious rambling. But in terms of being true to who I am and what I love. This is perfect. I even didn’t proofread it. So here’s to lots of mistakes.
This album is perfect. It’s perfect because it’s not perfect. It’s the right amount of adventurous. The right amount of baffling lyric mistakes. The right amount of horrifically sharp falsetto notes. The right amount of screamo. The right amount of lush strings. And the right amount of badass.
…I really wish the drums weren’t so quiet though.