Stepping Out

Come to the cabaret!

Annual festival in Long Beach salutes the Great American Songbook

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Long Beach is abloom with a spring weekend of music when a bevy of outstanding voices will be heard at the 14th annual Cabaret Festival, Thursday through Sunday, May 19-22. This celebration of cabaret, honoring the Great American Songbook (also known as American Standards), features performances by renowned performers who have appeared on Broadway and in Manhattan’s many cabaret venues.
The festival, presented by Artists in Partnership (AIP) and the Long Beach Public Library, celebrates the time-honored legacy of cabaret through a series of free performances and workshops throughout the weekend.
“We started the cabaret festival to kick off the summer season,” says Susan James, a founding director of AIP and the festival’s longtime producer. “Long Beach is a perfect place for the arts and artists.” “This festival, as with everything Artists in Partnership does, enhances the community and offers an exposure to the arts that wasn’t accessible to everyone before. Since we’ve started, it’s been an ongoing process of involving the community in different activities, of which the cabaret festival is an important part.”
James, who grew up in Rockville Centre and lived in Long Beach for 30 years, is a multi-faceted producer-director-actress and entrepreneur, with a particular passion for cabaret. She is eager to share herlove of cabaret with everyone through her yearly musical showcase.
“Cabaret is a unique genre of entertainment,” she says. “The Great American Songbook is reflective of so much of American culture and history. But it’s more than just hearing these songs. Cabaret involves a conversation between the performer and the artists. Each time I go to a cabaret performance I learn something about myself, the performer and the world. It’s a wonderful feeling.”
“These songs that are so well-known are interpreted very differently by each artist, who also tell personal stories, as part of their performance. The songs take on a different meaning each time you hear them that way. The audience gets more involved in the experience, than merely sitting there and tapping their toes. It’s about community, thought and ideas that all become part of a wonderful musical moment. Cabaret has a lot of theatrical, spontaneous qualities that make it truly special and personal.”
Festivalgoers can share in those extraordinary musical moments offered up in diverse performances on the library stage. “The caliber of artists that we have is outstanding,” says James. “Many of these artists are bringing their shows that they do on New York City stages here. All are truly world-class
performers.”
James serves as host when she opens the event with her multi-media presentation “The World of Cabaret,” Thursday, at 2 p.m. She discusses how artists bring unique interpretations to well-known songs, supplementing her talk with videos of contemporary performances, Broadway, movies, and novelty material.
The music gets going Thursday evening, at 7:30 p.m., with “Songs and Singers in the Making.” Aspiring singers Olivia DiResta, Anna Falvey, Mikayla Faria, and Max Tunney — all Long Beach High School students — participate in a “master class” workshop with renowned musical director jazz pianist Ted Firth and cabaret critic Rob Lester.
“It’s a terrific session for both the students and the audience,” says James. “It’s an opportunity for the students to perform for an audience and it allows the audience to see the process of development of a song and how it gets to the performance level.”

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