Rufus Wainwright - Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall [2 CD]
![Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall [2 CD]](/images/Rufus-Does-Judy-At-Carnegie-Hall-2-CD-B000XMZJX8-L.jpg)
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Category: Music CD
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CD Details
Artist: Rufus WainwrightEdition: Music CD
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
Format: Import, Live
CD Release Date: 2007-12-04
Music Label: Geffen Records
Soundtracks:
Music CD 1
- Overture: The Trolley Song/Over The Rainbow/The Man That Got Away
- When You're Smiling (The Whole World Smiles With You)
- Medley: Almost Like Being In Love/This Can't Be Love
- Do It Again
- You Go To My Head
- Alone Together
- Who Cares? (As Long As You Care For Me)
- Puttin' On The Ritz
- How Long Has This Been Going On
- Just You, Just Me
- The Man That Got Away
- San Francisco
- That's Entertainment
- I Can't Give You Anything But Love
- Come Rain Or Come Shine
- You're Nearer
- A Foggy Day
- If Love Were All
- Zing! Went The Strings Of My Heart
- Stormy Weather (Starring Martha Wainwright)
- Medley: You Made Me Love You/For Me And My Gal/The Trolley Song
- Rock-A-Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody
- Over The Rainbow (featuring Kate McGarrigle)
- Swanee
- After You've Gone (featuring Lorna Luft)
- Chicago
Music reviews of Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall [2 CD]
Music Review: Nice Idea...Gone Terribly Awry
Rating: 1 Stars
Wainwright is a singularly gifted alternative pop/rock artist and singer/songwriter--let's make no mistake about that.
His affection for Judy Garland is noble and he deserves three cheers for wanting to create (or, in this case, "re-create") something of significance to underscore her influence upon his musical development, life, worldview, what-have-you.
The idea for this completely modern and outside-the-mainstream artist to recreate the legendary Judy Garland Carnegie Hall concert in 1961 was interesting and, at the outset, so unexpected as to be kind of cool. The added bonus of on-stage participation by his equally talented mother (McGarrigle), sister (Martha) and even Lorna Luft (Garland's daughter) was all in excellent decorum.
Had Wainwright himself settled for the *tasteful* success of that initial, unique, one-night tribute at Carnegie Hall, the entire concept of this project would have gone down as an uqualified coup.
But, it's become painfully obvious that good taste degenerated into waste, once the idea itself became sensationalized and blown out of proportion into a "milk-it-for-all-it's-worth" commercial "gimmick."
The problem is not so much that Wainwright sings most of these songs poorly (and he *does* sing them quite poorly), or that that he is strikingly ill-suited to the genre--he hopefuly knew this and most everyone in attendance hopefully knew it from the start. No, at its inception, this was a labor of love and homage, and, in such a case, Wainwright could have been, should have been (and indeed WAS) forgiven for his obvious deficiences as a stylist for this particular musical material, on this particular occasion.
But Wainwright made the fatal mistake of taking what should have been a one-night-only slice of "tribute," seeing dollar signs, and then inflating the idea to proportions beyond the original premise. The uniqueness of his *own* night of "Judy-veneration" at Carnegie Hall was thus trivialized. Taking the show on the road to London, then to the Hollywood Bowl, opened the door for deserved criticism of the propriety of the main idea, and of Wainwright's inability to really sing the material at hand with anything resembling competence.
Basically, there was absolutely no reason why this "performance" ever deserved to be captured on a commercial recording. None. As a quirky, one-off concert-tribute in NYC, great. As a "brand" to be peddled commercially? Nah.
Wainwright is just plain awful on so many of these Tin Pan Alley tunes, ballads, and jazzy numbers, at least in terms of the "need" to record this evening for posterity and sell it to people who don't know any better, or who are expecting something reasonably good.
Given the brilliance of Garland's original show (and the multi-Grammy-winning, mega-selling 1961 album that captured it), this album is superfluous to the nth degree, and then some. His performances are (at best) mediocre, and the crowd excitement was ostensibly for the novelty of it all.
That being said, the only thing that should have ever seen the light of day as a commercial recording from this (initially) well-intentioned mess was Martha Wainwright's fine version of "Stormy Weather." Even then...meh.
Avoid this record like the plague and buy Rufus's fine original albums or the original Garland record. Rufus is exceptionally talented in his various "alternative" stylisms, but this is a weak effort that (as an album you might buy or continually enjoy) is rather awful...almost inappropriate. Believe me, it does not do Garland any favors (being a blatant commercial knock-off, now in album-form), nor does it do Wainwright any favors. As for the listener...cringe-city.
Again, there's no doubt about Wainwright's gifts as a singer of his own material, but one does get the sense that he really needed/wanted the easy money to have stretched this particular dime so painfully thin.
BTW: his Hollywood Bowl "version" of the "show" (which a few reviewers have mentioned here on Amazon) was indeed an absolute disaster--a shameful thing from a professional musician, especially one who was obviously using someone else's "prop" (Garland's Historic Setlist) as a come-on.
Description of Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall [2 CD]
RUFUS WAINWRIGHT - RUFUS DOES JUDY AT CARNEGIE HALL - CDALONG WITH A 36-PIECE ORCHESTRA RE-CREATES JUDY GARLAND'S CELEBRATED 1961 CARNEGIE HALL CONCERT SONG-FOR-SONG
On June 14, 2006, Rufus Wainwright took to the stage to recreate "the Greatest Show of All Time ever staged in honor of the Greatest Show of All Time"--Judy Garland's legendary 1961 concert at Carnegie Hall; song-for-song, in its original venue. Garland fanatics feared a fiasco, but the show was a triumph. His sophisticated act of homage to his hero was both a loving tribute and an arch commentary on the original, featuring classics like "Over The Rainbow," "Come Rain Or Come Shine" and "Zing! Went The Strings Of My Heart."
Backed by a 36-piece orchestra and arranged by the Broadway famed Stephen Oremus (Wicked, Avenue Q), Rufus's vocal talent soars over those classic melodies on this 2-disc set.
Also Available: RUFUS WAINWRIGHT - RUFUS! RUFUS! RUFUS! DOES JUDY! JUDY! JUDY! LIVE AT THE LONDON PALLADIUM -DVD
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