This article appeared in the March 26, 2003 Cambridge Chronicle.

Just a voice, a piano and an audience

By Susie Davidson

CORRESPONDENT

Ten years ago, singer, songwriter and music producer Will McMillan discovered the world of cabaret. He had seen an ad in the Boston Phoenix for cabaret classes in the South End taught by Cambridge resident Erica Leopold, whose first CD was released at Scullers this past month.

This Friday evening, Will & Company, McMillan’s concert series of Boston songwriters, will open the Boston Cabaret Festival 2003 at the Blacksmith House of the Cambridge Center For Adult Education in Harvard Square. The works of Iris Tanner will be featured, along with songs by Barbara Baig, Ernie LiJoi, Dennis Livingston, Krisanthi Pappas, Barry Rosenberg, Celia Slattery, and David Stern, with Doug Hammer on piano. The festival continues through the weekend with a Great American Lyricists concert on Saturday, and the Boston debut of internationally-acclaimed recording artist Amanda McBroom on Sunday, at Lexington’s National Heritage Museum; the three shows represent the grand finale to National Cabaret Month. The Festival, which has grown from one night at Scullers to this year’s three-night gala, was named by Bay Windows magazine as one of the Top Ten Cabaret Events of 2002

As a child and teen, McMillan, public relations director for the Cambridge Center for Adult Education, acted in commercials, plays and TV movies, which included The Four of Us with Barbara Feldon, Bound For Freedom with Fred Gwynne and Goldenrod with Donald Pleasance; he was a standby in the original production of Pippin on Broadway as well. As a Harvard undergrad, he directed theater productions and sang with the a cappella Harvard Din and Tonics; he moved on to pop/rock bands which included Cue, Adult Children of Heterosexuals and Q-Set, and the folk duo Jon and Will.

But Leopold’s classes were another venture entirely, a return to a simpler, less adorned time. “Cabaret reconnects us with how we used to live before electricity entered our lives, radio, TV, sound recordings, the movies and the internet,” he said. “At its simplest, it’s just a voice and a piano.”

His classmates began performing once a month at The Kendall Café, a piano bar at the time; The Boston Vocal Collaborative evolved as well and became the Boston Association of Cabaret Artists. McMillan learned of CCAE’s nascent cabaret series. “My offer to volunteer turned into a part-time job, and eventually ‘The Cabaret Connection’ became my responsibility,” he said. He began handling booking, publicity, stage managing, hosting open mics and leading workshops, seminars and master classes for all levels. He became CCAE’s PR director following the departure of Tracy Gibbs in 2000.

McMillan’s February, 2000 debut cabaret show sold out in advance; subsequent collaborations have included a series of revues, At The Movies with Nina Vansuch, Brian Patton and Michael Ricca, and the Will & Lil Show, with Lillian Rozin, as well as four recordings, Will Sings Sondheim, Simple (Jon and Will), Whimsy: The Allston Years and Sketchbook 1 with Steve Sweeting, and Will Sings Boston, a new CD of music by local songwriters. He was chosen, out of 37 performers, for a 1999 fellowship at the O'Neill Theater Center's 10th Cabaret Symposium, and received a 2002 Independent Reviewers of New England (IRNE) Award for Cabaret.

"I'm glad to have Will's series as part of the Festival because his shows have been so important in generating exposure for our local songwriters, and he has always championed new cabaret repertoire," said Festival producer and cabaret vocalist Sophia Bilides.

Bilides will host Saturday’s concert, a three-hour extravaganza in which Mary Callanan, Brian De Lorenzo, Kerry Dowling, Kent French, Belle Linda Halpern, Manny Lim, Carol O'Shaughnessy, Jan Peters, and Michael Ricca will each sing the songs of a certain lyricist. Johnny Burke, Sammy Cahn, Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Dorothy Fields, Ira Gershwin, Yip Harburg, Lorenz Hart, Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter, and Stephen Sondheim will be among those tributized to piano accompaniment by Doug Hammer, Tom LaMark, Brian Patton and Ron Roy.

"I started out last year with the idea of gathering many of our talented cabaret vocalists into one show, and that is still my primary focus. In fact, fully half of this year's roster is new, because I wanted to involve more singers,” explained Bilides, who was a 2003 IRNE Award nominee for Best Performance in Cabaret.

"I decided to devote this year's concert to the master lyricists of the Great American Songbook, the 'old school' if you will, which makes for a nice contrast with Friday night,” she continued.

Singer, songwriter, and actress McBroom has recorded nine albums, written a musical, published a songbook, and performed at clubs and concert halls in New York, London, the Far East, and Australia. Her Sunday solo concert, directed by Joel Silberman on piano, will include classic and contemporary cabaret.

“For me, cabaret is an event that honors the unique gifts of each individual performer,” said McMillan. “At its best, an intimacy and trust can develop between the audience and the performer that allow for all sorts of thoughts and feelings to be communicated.

“I am continually impressed by how powerful music can be,” he continued. “It keeps me in touch with my heart, my feelings, and even my optimism, because there are so many reasons to feel scared, powerless, and discouraged right now.”

The Boston Cabaret Festival 2003 takes place Friday, Saturday, Sunday, March 28, 29, 30, with three nights celebrating the songs and songwriters of cabaret. Tickets for Friday night at the Blacksmith House, Cambridge Center For Adult Education, 56 Brattle St., are $12 ($10 BACA), call 617-547-6789 x 1. Tickets for Saturday or Sunday at 7-10 p.m. at the National Heritage Museum, 33 Marrett Rd, Lexington, are $30/advance, $50/advance for Saturday and Sunday, $35/door, call 508-652-9834. For more information, visit www.BostonCabaretFestival.com