by Winslow Rogers

Note: The Sacramento Choral Calendar reviews local groups, but we are broadening our scope with a review of this King's Singers concert in Davis. We do this to inform and inspire local choral singers with news of this world-famous a cappella ensemble.

The King's Singers sang a sold-out Valentine's Day concert at the Mondavi Center (1,800 seats). This was their debut at the Mondavi Center, and as far as I know in the entire Sacramento region. As a long-time fan of the King's Singers, especially the pop music side of their repertoire, I jumped at the chance to hear them perform live in a concert devoted to the Great American Songbook. No meat-and-potatoes, all dessert!

During its existence this group has made as great a contribution to the cause of choral singing as any organization. The Mondavi Center program magazine provides a summary of their accomplishments including 150 recordings, 200 commissions, and countless published arrangements, joint appearances, and workshops for aspiring choral singers and groups.

(Click here to open the Mondavi Center program in a new window.)

The King's Singers, forty-five years old and counting, started as a group of friends singing together at King's College, Cambridge. Their vocal makeup has remained constant: two countertenors, one tenor, two baritones, and a bass. There has been remarkably little turnover since then: members stay with the group for an average of 12 years. It has always been a collaborative group with no music director.

The trademark King's Singers sound has changed very little. With two countertenors their sound is skewed higher than other male ensembles, and they can sing a greater variety of music. They breathe and sing as a single instrument, with truly phenomenal pitch control, diction, and precision in the performance of complex polyphonic arrangements. They have a light, clear sound, and use vibrato very little, only to vary the texture of the sound at certain times. Soloists are also there to enrich and vary the texture, not to draw attention to themselves.

While the King's Singers sing as one voice, I must give a shout-out to those at the top and the bottom. Countertenor David Hurley's powerful high notes are a marvel of nature. Bass Jonathan Howard has a fuller sound and a deeper range than King's Singers basses of the past, and I found this a welcome change.

Singing classical, pop, and experimental music with equal enthusiasm, they were crossover artists before the term was invented. Their covers of Billy Joel or the Beatles may sound overly intricate, and they make silly musical jokes, but beneath the surface is respect and love for whatever they choose to sing. They do not apologize for singing American pop music with their classically trained voices and upper-class British accents, and the result can provide fresh insight into familiar music.

You can learn about the music sung at this concert in the booklet of the CD issued to accompany this concert tour. The musical tracks are also available in MP3 format. The songs are sung in all-new arrangements by Alexander L'Estrange.

(Click here to open the Great American Songbook CD booklet in a new window.)

The opening was disconcerting to me. The men were spread out across the wide Mondavi Center stage, silhouetted in front of a bright yellow scrim. When the music began it sounded as if it was a much larger group right inside my head. There was a disconnect between what I saw and what I heard. I got used to this over-miking, and it helped me hear the group much more clearly than I otherwise would have, but the sound remained somewhat artificial to me.

Throughout the concert the staging was vivid and enjoyable. The group performed in various configurations and with different lighting effects, noticeable but not distracting to me. The introductions and patter between the songs was appropriate and funny. They made a pseudo-apology for their proper-British plain black suits, white shirts, and ties, and for their incompetence when it came to choreography.

As I say, the music came through loud and clear. In the first half of the program the group sang several spirituals, and made the point that this music was one of the foundations of the songs of the 1920s that led to what we now call the Great American Songbook. I was particularly moved by their performance of "Steal Away." I am used to hearing it sung with hushed, simple chords. The King's Singers began with low, throbbing, dissonant chords that vividly expressed the grinding present as well as the hoped-for future.

I had heard their arrangement of "Swing Low" before, and I continue to be perplexed at their pronunciation of "chariot," which I hear them sing as "char-i-oh," without the "t." It may be my hearing, or a bit of King's Singers eccentricity. I couldn't help thinking of the Colbert Report.

They then turned to the Great American Songbook. I have room to mention only a few highlights of the concert. "When I Fall in Love" was one of my favorites, and got one of the longest ovations from the audience. It was sung in a straightforward manner seasoned by a couple of rich key changes and a peaceful final chord.

I think of "I've Got You Under My Skin" and "Cry Me a River" as intense, emotional songs. The King's Singers gave new twists to both of them. "Skin" was one of the goose-bump songs of the concert for me. There was none of the extroverted energy of a Frank Sinatra, but a smooth bossa nova rhythm (yes, you read that right) that gradually created a more intimate sense of connection between the singer and the person under his skin. "River" was not an angry vengeful cry but, again, quieter and yet just as intense.

On the sillier side, the group had great fun with lightweight numbers like "It's De-Lovely" and "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered." Their jaunty treatments gave a sense of how these songs sounded to their original audiences before they were codified as standards. "De-Lovely" is a remake of "Makin' Whoopee," and follows the young couple beyond the altar as they try "to solve this riddle called married life." The climax, as in "Makin' Whoopee," is the arrival of the stork. "Bewitched" was sung as a waltz, which was bewildering but amusing to me.

The last song of the program was the Rodgers and Hart classic "The Lady is a Tramp," which provided the opportunity for the King's Singers to add lyrics of their own about tweeting and Michael Bublé.

After rousing applause, there were two encores, "At Last" and "Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye." The King's Singers played beautifully with the theme of the last song's lyric: "how strange the change from major to minor." After an evening of harmonic richness, this song, and the concert, ended on a simple major chord.

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Winslow Rogers was educated at Amherst College and Harvard University, where he earned a Ph.D. in English and American Literature. He is retired from a career as a professor and administrator at universities in the Midwest and in Southern California. He has followed the King's Singers enthusiastically since he first heard them in the mid seventies.