The MasterVoices, guided by Ted Sperling, have devoted their season to streaming Adam Guettel’s four-chapter theatrical song cycle “Myths and Hymns” and the climax, “Chapter Four: Faith,” came on May 26, on https://www.youtube.com/c/mastervoicesny . Orchestrations were by Don Sebesky and Jamie Lawrence.
With a small orchestra, consisting of Chuck Wilson, Dan Willis, and John Winder on woodwinds; Larry Lunetta on trumpet; Antoine Silverman on violin; Steve Bargonetti on guitar; Douglas Romoff on bass; Norbert Goldberg on percussion; and Todd Ellison on piano, under Sperling’s baton, singers Kelli O’Hara, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Nicholas Phan, and the MasterVoices took us, in wordless vocalise, along “The Great Highway,” with Costanzo directing and artist Erik Freer’s visuals. With dancers Emma Lou DeLaney, Milan Magaña, Justine Rafael, and Katja Stoer echoing them, singers Theresa McCarthy, apparently quarantining, and Miles Mykkanen, out in the world, joyously anticipated the goal of the journey in the bouncy “There’s a Land,” directed and choreographed by Andrew Palermo.
Jennifer Holliday, Broadway’s original Effie in “Dreamgirls,” and the Gospel Soul Children of New York uplifted the downtrodden and oppressed with a rousing “There’s a Shout,” directed by Sperling, with visuals of the world’s refugee camps by Artolution and Max Frieder. “Awaiting You,” with Mykal Kilgore singing the ethereal solo, was shot mostly in basic black-and-white, with a finale in color. Sperling directed.
After a visual prologue, showing theaters closed due to Covid-19, Larry Owens, assisted by piano, sang, in “Saturn Returns: the Return,” to empty auditoriums, then brought his song outdoors to the MasterVoices. Trip Cullman directed. “Myths and Hymns” came to its conclusion with the company, made up of cast members of all four chapters, swinging cheerfully, and gloriously hailing the post-pandemic world, in “Life After Darkness.”