On top of the stairs leading to the stage of Eugene's Silva Concert Hall,
a small note reminds musicians of the city's Ordnance No. 9.644: "Sound
pressure levels shall not exceed 98 dBA."

No similar warning is posted for the audience and that's a good thing
or we'd all be in jail by now.  Thomas Quasthoff sang Broadway tunes,
spirituals, classy pop songs, a Bobby McFerrin scat number, and "Danny
Boy," to one of the most tumultuous ovations in my memory -- every illegal
decibel well deserved.  Truth to tell, Oregon Bach Festival audiences tend
to "err" on the side of generosity, and they leap to their collective feet
perhaps more often than justified.  What is wrong with that is making the
Standing O routine when it should be reserved to a truly extraordinary
event such as today's.

Incidentally, the most vigorous applause through the concert came
from Quasthoff himself, in sincerely enthusiastic recognition for the
rest of the "band," especially conductor/pianist Jeffrey Kahane and
hornist/arranger Richard Todd, two great classical musicians who made
a seamless, convincing transition to jazz and played incredibly well,
completely in service of the singer and of the music.  Today's concert
should be used as a case study in teaching real ethics, morals and
selflessness, not the preachy kind.

The "applause" from Quasthoff, as all who have seen him perform know,
is symbolic because malformed arms and hands are part of his severe
birth defect.  And yet, nothing could be further from somebody we regard
as "handicapped" than this vibrant, powerful artist, reigning over an
enthralled, loving audience, fully cognizant of being in the presence of
greatness.

How can you imagine without being at the concert a combination of Sinatra,
Fischer-Dieskau, Satchmo and, yes, Ella?!  Add to that warmth, charisma,
and the rare ability to make each member of the audience feel as if being
alone with the singer, the exclusive focus of his attention (also known as
the Flicka Factor).

Others might have been called this, mostly without justification, but
Quasthoff truly is the Great Communicator: He happens to use a beautiful
and elegantly trained instrument to do it, but his ultimate skill is
communication, even more importantly than "just" singing.  Today, he gave
an unprecedent demonstration of that ability and the audience, becoming
a community, felt elevated to his level of perception and communication.
And, perhaps even beyond that lofty ideal, the man was having a ball --
something that doesn't happen nearly often enough in the ENTERTAINMENT
business.  In a striped sports shirt, briefly wearing sunglasses (and
doing a Stevie Wonder imitation), ranging over the stage, kibitzing and
participating in everything that happened, regardless of his role in it,
Quasthoff was having the time of his life...  as were we, the lucky
audience.

Kahane was in rare form too: he conducted a big, splashy, but disciplined
performance of the Symphonic Dances from "West Side Story" and served as
the brilliant pianist for Quasthoff for the rest of the concert, cutting
riffs short and deferring to the singer again and again.  And still,
"playing out" the concert with the quiet chords at the conclusion of "Danny
Boy" will long stay with the audience.  Todd, whose work with the Bach
Festival, Kahane's Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and elsewhere has been
consistently marvelous, played through the concert at Quasthoff's side,
and soloed in his own composition, "Quiet Time."

The singer opened with Gershwin's "They Can't Take That Away from Me" in a
section entitled "Tribute to Frank Sinatra," his spookily flawless American
diction (while chewing gum at the rehearsal, if -- I think -- not in
concert) coming through even clearer than Sinatra's...  and in a somewhat
greater range...:) He skipped the previously programmed "The Lady Is a
Tramp," and sang a scat-filled, free-and-easy "Fascinating Rhythm," closing
the first half with a simply overwhelming "Ol' Man River." Instead of
making the song "one thing" (singing it "beautifully" or with Robeson's
tragic slant), Quasthoff packed a dozen stories, a dozen styles into it,
and pulled those threads together in the final phrase that just stunned the
audience.

The concert's second half introduced the "TQ and Friends Jazz Quintet"
(Kahane, Todd, Forrest Moyer on bass, Alan Tarpinian on drums) starting
with Porter's "What is This Thing Called Love," the voice ranging over all
creation, making Quasthoff's professed trepidation about "too high notes"
in "Rigoletto" suspect as excessive humility or caution...  or both.

The Mercer-Arlen "One for My Baby, and One More for the Road," and the
Hilliard-Mann "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" combined Cleo Laine's
virtuosity with that "Sinatra sound" again, and yet every moment was
unmistakably Quasthoff.

The most bizarre and amazing part of the concert was a McFerrin "vocal
music" piece, doing full justice to the sound-composer known in Germany as
"Stimmwunder" and throwing in some Bantu clicks and prehistoric bird sounds
for good measure, while maintaining a rhythm section coming from somewhere
under the voice, a place that normally doesn't exist.

An extended, improv-added version of "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" and a
quiet, exquisite version of "Danny Boy" closed the concert, much against
the wishes of the audience, which simply stayed even after the lights went
up.

This "throwaway concert" -- in-between Quasthoff's participation here in
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, Mendelssohn's "Elijah," Bach's St. Matthew
Passion, and a lieder recital -- showed lack of preparation in the singer's
virtually unprecedented reliance on the score and occasional errors in the
lyrics.  And that means just one thing: if there is a similar concert in
the future, Quasthoff will be "better." Now there is a strange thought!

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