Music & As You Like It

Music & As You Like It

Music plays a prominent role in Shakespeare’s comedy, As You Like It. In fact, there are as many songs in this work as in any other play he wrote. We’ve been meaning to dedicate a show specifically to this comedy for some time. This is that show.  We’ll be performing settings of all the lyrics in the play using original compositions, some of which we’ll premier.

Some of the lyrics like “Under the Greenwood Tree” will have multiple settings, each of which puts its own spin on the play. In addition, we have a setting by the composer, Thomas Morley of “It Was a Lover and His Lass” from 1600 that might have been used in original performances of the play at the Globe Theatre. We don’t have definitive proof, but Shakespeare and Morley lived in the same parish in London.

Besides illustrating the musical styles in Shakespeare’s day, Morley’s setting also gives us clues about how to handle one of the play’s central staging questions about the main setting for most of the action, namely:

Q: how do you portray the Forest of Arden?

Do you choose

• a realistic forest,
• a symbolic “forest of the mind,” or
• a forest that’s a disguised version of Duke Senior’s court?

The answer, somewhat surprisingly, can shift depending on what music you use. We’ll show this by performing several different settings of the same texts so that audience can hear this in action.

Besides songs from As You Like It, we’ll also feature material from other plays. Musical styles include glam rock, Western swing, European art song, early 1950s R&B, Scots-Irish folk music, New Orleans piano ballads, bossa nova, Weimer cabaret, jug band songs, homages to the Second Viennese School, period correct (i.e., circa 1600), parodies of radio ads from the 1940s, and several other genres, in other words, a little something for everyone.

Performances from Sarah Callahan, Sophie Caplin, Laura Lenz Landstad, and Sarah Zuber.

More details at https://kentakata.com

Tickets at:  https://americanschoolofstorytelling.com/event/ken-takata-ensemble/

Join us on Thursday evening (6/4) at the American School of Storytelling. We are just a four-minute walk from the Walker Art Center, making us the perfect follow-up to their Free Thursday Night program.