CONCERT REVIEW: Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra With Bernadette Peters at the Auditorium Theatre (Chicago, IL)

      On March 31st, 2017, I saw the Boston Pops Orchestra With Bernadette Peters at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University in Chicago, IL.  I didn't know I was seeing this concert until the day of the show.  It probably would have benefited me to read about the concert more prior to seeing it (though it was only a one-nigbt event).  If I knew more about the show, it wouldn't have surprised, and annoyed me, that the entire first act of the concert was monopolized by the Boston Pops Orchestra.  I was there to hear Bernadette Peters sing show tunes.  I think the Chicago Symphony Orchestra could have played Gershwin just fine.  Then again, I might just be metropolitan.  Maybe the Chicago Symphony Orchestra doesn't know how to play Gershwin.  That's fine with me.  "Rhapsody in Blue" is too long any way.






     Finally Act Two began and Bernadette Peters came out on the stage.  On the one hand, she looked fabulous.  On the other hand, she looked fabulous.  Yes.  Both of her hands looked fabulous.  Songs she sang at the concert included  "Send in the Clowns" from "A Little Night Music," "Losing My Mind" from "Follies," and "No One is Alone" from "Into the  Woods."  She sang "No One is Alone" not long after talking about living alone in a big, empty house on Long Island.  Also, during the song when she sang the line "hard to see the light now..." she looked directly up at the blinding stage lights.  She then took her index finger and used it to flap her lips.  Oh wait, no she didn't.  She did sing this obscure song about a dog though.  It was the same song Mandy Patinkin sang during "An Evening With Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin" in 2013, after which I went "Wooooo!"  







     Prior to one song, Bernadette Peters wanted help climbing onto the grand piano, and asked the Conductor for assistance.   Instead of giving her a hand, he walked off stage.  That was a little surprising.    But she ended up not needing his help after all, because before long, Bernadette Peters was atop the grand piano preparing to sing the next song.  It cost me nothing to see this show.  I was offered the ticket by someone I barely knew.  Not too long after seeing the show, I contacted him and thanked him again.  He pretended not to know me and said it wasn't him who gave me the concert ticket.  Sure, this was frustrating, but I was just glad I got to see such an amazing show...or concert.  I'm sure it's noticeable that I changed topics halfway through this paragraph, and that it lacks cohesion to the extent of the musical "Song & Dance."  Well, Bernadette Peters starred in that show, yet didn't sing a song from it during the concert.  That is strangely odd and oddly strange. 







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