With President-elect Barack Obama’s overwhelming ride to the White House, singer Holly Larocque is banking on the country’s mood to party.
“We’re hoping people feel more like celebrating,” Larocque said. “There’s a good feeling in the United States, a new chapter has opened.”
And, Larocque hopes, when people feel like celebrating, they want to listen to the feel-good music of Big Band, adding that the show “Big Band Broadcast” is a production that is a “true celebration of the Big Band era.”
“Big Band Broadcast” stars singer Larocque and the Mark Ferguson Orchestra. The show opens Wednesday for one performance at historic Everett Theatre before playing Nov. 22 at Edmonds Center for the Arts and then continuing on its 15-city tour.
Larocque and Ferguson, with his 13-piece orchestra, present their live concerts as if the audience were listening to a 1940s radio broadcast.
As Larocque explained it in a cell-phone call from her tour bus, the broadcast is produced by a group of top-flight players — “each and every one is a showman” — who put together driving rhythms during this make-believe radio show that comes with a rather unpredictable radio announcer, made-up vintage commercials that she and Ferguson have written and some “downright outrageous band choreography.”
“I’m traveling with a whole lot of hams,” Larocque said.
Larocque said the intent of “Big Band Broadcast” is to provide a “new sound for the new millennium” and promised that audiences will swoon to Ferguson’s lush, witty and textured arrangements.
“It’s tremendously strong music … it held families together and countries together and had great personality and staying power,” she said. “Today, where we are severely challenged again, the music is so uplifting and it emotionally and spiritually stimulates the crowd.”
Larocque’s love affair with Big Band began before she was 3 with her father, a World War II pilot, who would play a game with his daughter where he would hum a swing tune and she’d have to guess which one. Her favorite song to this day and the sign-off in the show is “I’ll Be Seeing You.” Other tunes include “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” “I’ve Got a Crush on You,” “And the Angels Sing” and “In the Mood.”
Larocque wouldn’t reveal her age, saying, “A woman who tells you that will tell you anything.” Larocque possesses a brassy, Big Band voice that she developed on the job working with Big Bands.
“It’s true show biz. A very glamorous entity,” gushed Larocque, who wears specially created gowns, wigs and jewels during the concert.
Larocque is known as the Canadian star of Disney’s “Under the Umbrella Tree,” a somewhat Sesame-Street-esque production. She did more than 300 shows from 1987 to 1994. This versatile Canadian performer has other credits, including CBC specials “Holly Larocque: It’s About Time” and “Christmas Holly.” She has written and starred in a one-woman show, “Holly: From Broadway to Brussels.” She is a featured personality in photographer Michelle Valberg’s book “Dare to Dream,” a compendium of exceptional Canadian women, and has co-starred with Broadway legend Carol Channing, according to press material.
Though she’s a Canadian singing iconic American music, Larocque said the audiences are very bipartisan when it comes to Big Band, especially when they see and hear the love and respect she and the musicians have for the music. Larocque said “Big Band Broadcast” has a way of reaching across borders.
“We are singing the American songbook and it turns out to be one of the wonderful ways that America and Canada come together,” she said. “It’s that universal language thing.”
Reporter Theresa Goffredo: 425-339-3424 or goffredo@heraldnet.com.
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