John Pizzarelli

This show was one of the more unusual musical events that I have been to. First it was very intimate. The Grand Opera in Dubuque is a gorgeously remodeled venue that has seating for 622. So intimate in that way, but also because the performer acted much like someone who was a dinner guest who pulls out his guitar afterwards and proceeds to play a few songs. So he plays a couple of songs, backed up by a competent trio that includes his brother, Martin Pizzarelli, on bass, and a very good pianist and drummer--three people who probably wouldn't have been in your living room, and if you exclude Rock Band, we don't actually have a drum set. Then he takes some time to talk about the songs he just played, who wrote them, maybe some of the context around the song, who sang it, and maybe how they came to find the song.

So this was part concert--with an emphasis on the music of Duke Ellington, Rogers and his two frequent collaborators--Hall or Hammerstein, many of them easily recognized, and part history lesson. There were several twists that I got, and probably an equal number that I didn't. In addition to all the back story, Pizzarelli "updates" the words of some songs, and in others where he feels the lyrics don't make very much sense, he changes them, adds a pre-story so that you can see where the song came from, or tells more so you can see where it went. It is very clever, very funny, and very pleasant. I am definitely checking out his radio show, Radio Deluxe. He is a find.

Finally, a word about the theater itself. It was one of the nicest theaters I have been in. It was built in 1890 in the Richardsonian architecture style. This is a style of Romanesque Revival architecture named after architect Henry Hobson Richardson, whose masterpiece is Trinity Church, Boston (1872–77), designated a National Historic Landmark. Richardson first used elements of the style in his Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane in Buffalo, New York, designed in 1870. This very free revival style incorporates 11th and 12th century southern French, Spanish and Italian Romanesque characteristics. In other words, kind of a mish mash, but in this case it works. The facade is impressive, and the inside is very pretty, but it is also quite intimate, in both feel and size. A really lovely place to see music.