Renee Elise Goldsberry at Deer Valley

Another favorite summer tradition is to see a Utah Symphony concert at Deer Valley as part of the Deer Valley Music Festival.  I love coming to these concerts because it is so beautiful and relaxing up in the mountains and I really enjoy bringing a picnic and listening to music under the stars.  I usually try to see at least one concert every summer (this year I picked two of them) and last night's concert featured the amazing Renee Elise Goldsberry, who originated the role of Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton (Have I mentioned that I saw the original Broadway cast of Hamilton?  Oh, I have?  Several times?  Just checking.).  I have been looking forward to this concert for months because I loved her as Angelica and it was wonderful!  She began with a medley of "On a Clear Day (You Can See Forever)" and "I Can See Clearly Now" which got the audience cheering!  Then she mentioned how impressed she was the the Utah Symphony could play the blues and sang very sultry versions of "People Get Ready" and "I've Got to Use My Imagination."  Next, she performed an arrangement of "We Can Work It Out" by the Beatles that I really enjoyed.  She thought it would be appropriate to sing "Up to the Mountain" in such a beautiful setting and then turned Deer Valley into an old time revival by singing "Tell the Lord I'm Coming Home Someday."  She had her backup singers (who were fabulous) join her for an a capella version of "We Who Believe in Freedom Cannot Rest" that was incredibly powerful!  She spoke about wanting to have children for a long time and dedicated Bob Dylan's "Lord Protect My Child" to all of the children who are here and who are on their way.  She ended her first set by singing an incredibly beautiful version of "Bridge Over Troubled Waters."  After the intermission she sang "Beat Out Dat Rhythm on a Drum" from Carmen Jones, "How Glad I Am," "Misty," and "Peter Gunn."  My favorite part of the concert came next when she sang the Broadway hits.  Her first starring role was in The Lion King and she sang the most beautiful version of "Shadowlands," which is my favorite song from the show, that I have ever heard!  In fact, it reduced me to a sobbing mess!  Of course, she sang a few songs from Hamilton, including "Satisfied" and "The Schuyler Sisters," and I noticed that just about everyone in the audience was singing along.  It was incredible!  She also starred in the musical RENT and she ended her second set with moving renditions of "Without You" and "No Day But Today."  For the encore she performed "It's Quiet Uptown" from Hamilton which I have never been able to sit through without crying and this was no exception.  Her final song was "You'll Never Walk Alone" because she wanted to go out on a happy note!  I loved every minute of this concert and I can't wait to come back to Deer Valley in two weeks to see Kristin Chenoweth!  Go here to see the rest of the lineup at the Deer Valley Music Festival.

Note:  I was also able to see Leslie Odom, Jr., who originated the role of Aaron Burr in Hamilton, with the Utah Symphony a few years ago.  I think everyone in the whole original cast should come perform a concert at Deer Valley!

Mamma Mia at Sundance

One of my very favorite summer traditions is to see a musical at the Sundance Mountain Resort performed in conjunction with the UVU Theatre Department.  I have been coming for years and I absolutely love it!  The setting could not be more beautiful with the smell of the pine trees and the fresh mountain air.  It is so nice to feel a cool breeze when the temperature is so hot in the valley.  They always do a really great job with whatever show they are performing and this year is especially fun because the show is Mamma Mia!  How can you resist listening to the music of Abba up in the mountains?  Sophie Sheridan (Rylin Gardner) is getting married and wants to have her Dad walk her down the aisle.  The only problem is she doesn't know who he is!  After reading her mother's diary, she finds three possibilities:  Sam Carmichael (Shawn Stevens), Bill Austin (Matt Dobson), and Harry Bright (Sanford Porter).  Without telling her mother Donna (Dianna Graham), she invites all three of them to her wedding and, when they all show up, chaos ensues!  I really enjoyed Graham as Donna and Stevens as Sam and they are especially strong in their songs together, including "One of Us," "SOS," and "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do."  Jocelyn Hansen, as Rosie, and Kerilyn Johnson, as Tanya, are also a lot of fun and I enjoyed their renditions of "Chiquitita" and "Dancing Queen."  Hansen steals the show with her performance in "Take a Chance on Me" with Dobson and hoots of laughter greeted their antics!  I thought that Gardner faltered a little bit as Sophie in the beginning of the show but she finished strong, particularly with "I Have a Dream" at the end.  The choreography in this show is fantastic and I particularly liked it when the male ensemble danced with fins in "Lay All Your Love on Me" and I thought the dream sequence in "Under Attack" was quite innovative (it's one of my favorite numbers in the show).  The costumes are a hoot and feature lots of spandex and sequins!  I had so much fun watching this show and I may or may not have sung along with some of the songs!  I highly recommend it.  Mamma Mia runs at the Eccles Outdoor Theatre on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays through August 10 (go here for tickets).

The Lion King

When I saw the first trailer for the live action remake of The Lion King, I thought the images were absolutely stunning (they reminded me of the safaris I took in Africa) and I have been looking forward to seeing it all summer!  I dismissed the negative reviews as critics who are too attached to the narrative that Disney should not be remaking their animated classics to give the movie a chance and I fully expected to love it as I walked into the theater last night.  I didn't love it.  The script is very faithful to the 1994 version and includes an almost shot-for-shot recreation with photorealistic CGI.  To be sure, the images are absolutely beautiful and I really loved the opening scene when all of the animals assemble for the presentation of Simba (the baby elephants!) and when a piece of Simba's fur travels back to the Pride lands to give Rafiki proof that he is still alive.  The animals look incredibly life-like but when they talk and sing, which are human characteristics, their expressions are, well, lifeless.  The photorealistic CGI loses a lot of the emotion that the animated version, which is more anthropomorphic, has so it wasn't quite as magical as I thought it would be.  I also had problems with the pacing of this movie.  It seemed so much longer than the original and I found my mind wandering quite a bit.  It might be because everything is so similar to the original so I was anticipating everything that happened before it did.  Despite an all-star voice cast, I found the performances to be a bit bland because there is such a disconnect between the characters and the voices.  I hope that the Beyhive won't track me down and kill me but I thought that Beyonce was basically portraying herself.  I saw her every time she spoke rather than Nala.  I did, however, love her rendition of "Can You Feel The Love Tonight?" with Donald Glover but it seemed more like a music video featuring documentary animal footage rather than a song sung by two lions falling in love with each other.  I also really liked her new song "Spirit."  An exception to the bland performances would be Chiwetel Ejiofor as Scar because his portrayal is much more menacing than the campy villainy of Jeremy Irons and I really enjoyed his version of "Be Prepared" because there is a dangerous energy to it.  I really wanted to love it but, after so much anticipation, I was honestly a bit disappointed with this movie.  I recommend watching your VHS copy of the original, instead.

Summer Reading: The Witch Elm

The next selection on my summer reading list, The Witch Elm by Tana French, is an intense psychological character study that challenged me to think and that is the best kind of book, in my opinion! Toby Hennessy has always thought of himself as lucky. He is good-looking, intelligent, and charismatic enough to talk himself out of any tricky situation. He has a group of loyal friends, a devoted girlfriend, and a supportive extended family of means. However, after a night of drinking with his mates, his luck changes because he is attacked during a burglary attempt on his flat and suffers a catastrophic brain injury. He takes refuge at his family's ancestral home on the outskirts of Dublin with his uncle Hugo and cousins Leon and Susannah to care for him. While he is recuperating there, a body with connections to everyone in the house is found buried in the wych elm tree in the garden. As the murder is investigated, Toby comes to question everything he thought about himself, his family, and his upbringing. The narrative starts very slowly as Toby struggles to overcome the physical and psychological trauma he has endured but this becomes very relevant as the murder mystery unfolds. It was difficult to plod through the beginning but once the action gets going I was absolutely riveted. Toby is the ultimate unreliable narrator because his charmed existence made him oblivious to events surrounding the murder of his former classmate and his brain injury makes his own memories suspect. This adds greatly to the suspense. French's writing style, in this particular novel, is very cerebral with long meditative passages so it might not be for everyone. I enjoyed it because it made me think about how we view ourselves compared to how others view us, what role memory plays in our view of ourselves, and how our actions have consequences that reverberate far more than we imagine. It is a brilliant character study that takes some effort to get thorough but is ultimately worth the trouble.

Note:  Have you read The Witch Elm?  What did you think?

Detour to the Grand Canyon

Yesterday I decided to take the scenic route home from Phoenix which, ironically, is actually faster than driving on the freeway through Las Vegas.  I found myself on Highway 89 on the way to Page, Arizona when I started seeing signs for the Grand Canyon.  Even though I was really tired (I was too keyed up from the concert the night before to go to sleep) and eager to get home, I spontaneously took the exit to go to the South Rim!  I spent a little more than an hour there and I only visited the viewpoints near the East entrance (I knew from experience that they wouldn't be as crowded as other areas) but it was pretty spectacular!

The pictures don't really do justice to how amazing the canyon really is!  It is quite awe-inspiring!  Even though it added about two hours to the drive home, I'm really glad I decided to visit the Grand Canyon.  Unexpected detours like this are one of the reasons I love taking road trips!

Note:  My last visit to the Grand Canyon was not as pleasant.  Apparently, I used quite a bit of profanity while dealing with the large crowds and lack of parking (or so my nephew tells me frequently!)