Chess in Concert Best Review
My husband introduced this to me on CD many years ago. The version he had was from the 1986 production in England with the original cast (including Elaine Paige). He actually got to see it live in England. The original CD was a great way to get to know the story because some of the words get pretty complex in some of the songs. The complexity of the music is something I really love so the trouble with hearing some of the words doesn't take anything away from how great I think this is. It's well worth watching more than once to pick up all the details. This version with Josh Groban & Idina Menzel was such a joy to see & hear. Josh Groban has a beautiful strong voice and I wish he'd do more productions like this. His abilities to portray the emotion appropriate to the story was something that really made this so engaging. I loved watching his acting as much as hearing his singing. Idina Menzel is always great on stage and she was the perfect choice for the role of Florence. Adam Pascal as Freddie also did an amazing job. The entire cast gave such incredible performances. Top all that with London Philharmonic & the 100 member West End Chorus and the results are outstanding! All of the music is so memorable and interesting thanks to Tim Rice from ABBA for the story & lyrics & Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus for the music. I'm thrilled that this was redone and available on DVD!! I would love to have seen this one live.
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Chess in Concert Overview
Starring multiplatinum artist Josh Groban, Tony-winning Idina Menzel (Wicked) and Tony nominated Adam Pascal (RENT), Chess In Concert revives the eclectic yet wonderfully pop 1984 concept album featuring the music of ABBA's Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson and lyrics of Tim Rice (Jesus Christ Superstar, The Lion King, Evita). Recorded at London's Royal Albert Hall in May 2008, this spectacular Chess In Concert - introduced by Rice and with the 50- piece City of London Philharmonic and 100-voice West End Chorus - finally fulfills the promise of the popular cult musical.
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Customer Reviews
Chess - Teresa J. Weisgerber -
As a fan of Josh Groban, I was anxious to view his performance in Chess. I was not disappointed. The entire production was well done and quite enjoyable to watch. The DVD package was very nice, as well.
Good, but not great - Anne B. - Tarrytown, NY United States
I got this video, because Josh Groban is in it -- and I'm currently obsessed with him. He gave a superlative performance, hopefully assuring that he'll have more chances to do musical theater, which is, apparently, what he really wants to do.
Curiously, there were only three really top notch solo voices in the piece: Josh Groban, David Bedella, and Clarke Peters. The other soloists had disappointing vocal instruments. It seems odd to me that it is apparently so hard to find people who can really sing.
The chorus and dancing were well done.
The story is not so hot. It's overly complex and contrived. The motivations of the main characters are puzzling. Why does Anatoly leave his more attractive wife for this strange chess groupie, for instance? Perhaps it's the acting. The three I mentioned above who sing well, also manage to convey more drama in their roles. The others seem superficial, not truly engaged in their parts. As a result the whole thing lacks the emotional drama it should have.
I'm glad I got it, though, because I wanted to hear Josh & that I got from this. He just sort of blew everyone else off the stage.
Reworked again - John Bernhardt - Falmouth, Ma United States
Recorded live at Royal Albert Hall, London, May 12-13, 2008
There is also a single CD Highlights version and DVD version which were released both in the United States and Europe. This concert version stars Josh Groban and was taped a full year before it's release. This is yet another reworking of the ever changing Andersson-Rice-Ulvaeus musical.
This time, Tim Rice took the lead on the redo duties. Bjorn Ulvaeus Andersson and Benny did not get directly involved with this concert ,though perhaps they had a veto, if they did not like the project as a whole. This record is an attempt to issue a fairly complete version of the musical, based generally on the original London staging. Somewhat annoyingly, Tim Rice has once again changed a few lyrics. On the plus side, you get to hear a few of the songs that were written long ago, which had not been available on any recording of CHESS (other then a temporary release on the original version of the Danish Version of Chess) the songs are "Commie newspapers"," Press conference", "Global TV fanfare", "Talking Chess" and "The Interview". These are not great songs, but it's still nice to have them. Most of the songs found only on the American Broadway staging did not make it on this recording, but otherwise this concert is really complete Chess score.
The album was recorded live, and as a result many of the performances sound a little shaky. Another problem for me with any re-recording or theatrical staging of Chess is losing out on getting Benny Andersson and the ABBA band play the music as it meant to be played. I would say that if you want the definitive CHESS album it would seem that it is still your best bet to go back to the original 1984 studio album.
Performers include Idina Menzel, Adam Pascal, David Bedella, Kerry Ellis, Clarke Peters, Marti Pellow ; The City of London Philharmonic ; The West End Chorus ; arranged and orchestrated by Anders Eljas ; David Firman, conductor, musical supervisor. Liner notes by Tim Rice and synopsis in container.
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