Charles Job couldn’t resist revealing a grin as he proudly noted the Palm Court Light Orchestra was in its 26th year.
“We’re still waiting to be discovered,” he deadpanned at Sidney’s Mary Winspear Centre during Over the Rainbow, a virtually flawless concert showcasing highlights from MGM movie musicals and other period gems.
Watching the white-haired founder and conductor lead 26 top-shelf local musicians through hummable classics from musicals such as The Wizard of Oz, The Sound of Music, Annie Get Your Gun and Gigi was a heavenly, transporting experience.
It was also a reminder that while we take such local gems for granted, they rely on grants and sponsors for survival.
“It just makes you want to sing along with them,” said Sidney’s Pat Todd, 72, who’s as much a fan of the theatre.
“The Mary Winspear Centre is such a wonderful venue. I’ve seen more here in the last three years than in my lifetime, I think.”
So are Phyllis King, Brenda Whittingham and Elsie Hay, three seniors who volunteer at Sidney’s cultural showplace.
“This is one of my favourite places,” said King, who also volunteered when Bachelor Canada taped there last year, and last weekend when Australia’s male dance revue Thunder Down Under attracted a younger crowd. “That was a wild one.”
Added one spectator: “There were some 80-year-olds there who left early. It was the talk of our morning exercise class.”
The Palm Court concert was more up their alley, judging by the older capacity crowd’s reaction at the Charlie White Theatre.
And with highlights like mezzo soprano Kathryn Whitney’s pristine renditions of I Can’t Say No from Oklahoma!, the Richard Rodgers classic Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered and others in a theatre notable for great acoustics, what wasn’t to like?
“I’ve been coming here for years,” said Joe Kerkhoven, 91. “It’s the place to be and I enjoy the beautiful music.”
Birger Nenzen, 77, wasn’t surprised the shows, also performed at UVic Centre and Cowichan Theatre, sell out in Sidney.
“It’s just so catchy and so much fun and the quality of the professional musicians and the bandleader is great,” he said.
“It was a golden time,” said Job, explaining his movie-musicals inspiration. “It was a period when George Gershwin was still writing, and Cole Porter. It was an extension of Broadway which was beginning to be not as important as it once was. A lot of songwriters were moving to movies. It represents a period of iconic performers like Judy Garland, Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire.”
Job often finds himself explaining what sets palm court orchestras apart.
“We don’t play Beethoven and Brahms,” he says. “We’re a light orchestra that would have played at places like the Empress in the 1920s. They would have played lighter things and show music. If there was a palm court orchestra at the hotel today, they might be playing film scores — John Williams, stuff like that, or Lloyd Webber and older things.”
This season, the orchestra also celebrated Downton Abbey and George Gershwin.
The 27th season, beginning in October, includes Flying Down to Rio, a Latin American musical celebration; a tribute to Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops; and a romantic Valentine’s Day concert featuring music from La Bohème, Tosca and more.