Goddamn, if I don't have the best tunes
Dec. 20th, 2006 09:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaSo, as mentioned in the previous post, last week I was eating Monster Munch for tea...
If any of you paid detailed attention to my band recommendations, then you might have noticed that one of the members of said band has written a musical. Apparently he was watching The Prince of Egypt and, being arrogant, thought "I could do that" and resolved to write a musical. Being also thoroughly perverse, he chose the book of Job.
This musical has been performed on a few occasions, and for one night only last week it was on in London.
And so I made my way out to Barons Court, to a pub called Curtains Up. It's a fairly unremarkable pub, all in all, until you realise that in its basement it has a tattered, bijou-but-fully-functional theatre. When I say bijou, I do of course mean titchy. As PeacockJr said to me "They say it seats 60, but I don't see it. I reckon about 5." I tucked myself into one of the worn red velvet seats, eyed the line of music stands across the minute stage, and waited expectantly.
I have to say, my expectations weren't terribly high. Firstly, they were going to (and I quote(ish) from a promotional wossname) "perform a play written for a West End theatre with a million pound budget and a cast of two hundred actors, three camels and elephant in a 60-seat theatre with a budget of around five pounds and a cast of six actors and no camels at all". Secondly, it was a musical based on Job. Really. If you're not familiar with the book of Job, it is as about as suited to musical adaptation as whelks are to actuarial work. Thirdly, I'd just been feeding Mrs Job crisps and listening to her saying things along the lines of "oh my god, what were we thinking, aaargh".
Six people dressed in black shuffled onto the stage and squeezed themselves in behind the music stands. One picked up an acoustic guitar. One began to read out the stage directions for what we would have been seeing if only the £1M West End camel plan had come to fruition...
And do you know what ? It was bloody marvellous and very, very funny.
The Book of Job: The Musical is probably best avoided if you don't like to see people poking fun at the Bible - Job is an easy book to mock because, to be honest, it's a pretty difficult book to comprehend (and even some Biblical scholars are of the opinion that the whole thing was meant as satire anyway). Briefly, Satan bets God that if Job's material wealth were taken away, Job would swiftly cease praising God. God takes him up on the bet, and Job's life proceeds to suck for the next 35 chapters or so. It was interesting to note, though, that some of Job's songs and even some of Satan's songs could have been lifted more or less wholesale into a "serious" musical.
More than anything, what surprised me was the standard of the composition. I know Simon Clayton can write songs of the three-minute-burst variety; I'm not sure I expected him to be able to competently score a complete musical with a consistent feel, good use of recurring tunes and themes and contrepuntal wossnames from the different characters. And carry it off with nothing but an acoustic guitar. Also bonus points for getting someone with a hugely resonant bass voice to sing the part of God. And - the test of a decent musical - I was singing bits from it on the way home. Some of the dialogue - particularly between Satan and God - could have done with a bit of tightening up, but it was well-rehearsed and overall the effect was a very long way from the shambles I'd been rather expecting.
There is a sadly out-of-date Geocities page at http://www.jobthemusical.co.uk, which has some downloads to offer - but to be honest, out of context they don't really work as well and they're not great recordings. I'd recommend holding out for a performance near you and going to see it.
If any of you paid detailed attention to my band recommendations, then you might have noticed that one of the members of said band has written a musical. Apparently he was watching The Prince of Egypt and, being arrogant, thought "I could do that" and resolved to write a musical. Being also thoroughly perverse, he chose the book of Job.
This musical has been performed on a few occasions, and for one night only last week it was on in London.
And so I made my way out to Barons Court, to a pub called Curtains Up. It's a fairly unremarkable pub, all in all, until you realise that in its basement it has a tattered, bijou-but-fully-functional theatre. When I say bijou, I do of course mean titchy. As PeacockJr said to me "They say it seats 60, but I don't see it. I reckon about 5." I tucked myself into one of the worn red velvet seats, eyed the line of music stands across the minute stage, and waited expectantly.
I have to say, my expectations weren't terribly high. Firstly, they were going to (and I quote(ish) from a promotional wossname) "perform a play written for a West End theatre with a million pound budget and a cast of two hundred actors, three camels and elephant in a 60-seat theatre with a budget of around five pounds and a cast of six actors and no camels at all". Secondly, it was a musical based on Job. Really. If you're not familiar with the book of Job, it is as about as suited to musical adaptation as whelks are to actuarial work. Thirdly, I'd just been feeding Mrs Job crisps and listening to her saying things along the lines of "oh my god, what were we thinking, aaargh".
Six people dressed in black shuffled onto the stage and squeezed themselves in behind the music stands. One picked up an acoustic guitar. One began to read out the stage directions for what we would have been seeing if only the £1M West End camel plan had come to fruition...
And do you know what ? It was bloody marvellous and very, very funny.
The Book of Job: The Musical is probably best avoided if you don't like to see people poking fun at the Bible - Job is an easy book to mock because, to be honest, it's a pretty difficult book to comprehend (and even some Biblical scholars are of the opinion that the whole thing was meant as satire anyway). Briefly, Satan bets God that if Job's material wealth were taken away, Job would swiftly cease praising God. God takes him up on the bet, and Job's life proceeds to suck for the next 35 chapters or so. It was interesting to note, though, that some of Job's songs and even some of Satan's songs could have been lifted more or less wholesale into a "serious" musical.
More than anything, what surprised me was the standard of the composition. I know Simon Clayton can write songs of the three-minute-burst variety; I'm not sure I expected him to be able to competently score a complete musical with a consistent feel, good use of recurring tunes and themes and contrepuntal wossnames from the different characters. And carry it off with nothing but an acoustic guitar. Also bonus points for getting someone with a hugely resonant bass voice to sing the part of God. And - the test of a decent musical - I was singing bits from it on the way home. Some of the dialogue - particularly between Satan and God - could have done with a bit of tightening up, but it was well-rehearsed and overall the effect was a very long way from the shambles I'd been rather expecting.
There is a sadly out-of-date Geocities page at http://www.jobthemusical.co.uk, which has some downloads to offer - but to be honest, out of context they don't really work as well and they're not great recordings. I'd recommend holding out for a performance near you and going to see it.
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no subject
Date: 2006-12-20 11:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-20 11:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-20 11:04 am (UTC)My favourite character from the Book of Job is also the shortest man in the Bible -- Bildad the Shoe-height.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-20 02:06 pm (UTC)