Latest news with #PorgyandBess'
![Cynthia Erivo's Fave Vocal Performances Include A Shocking Pick: Sisqó's 'Thong Song' [List]](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fglobalgrind.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F16%2F2025%2F07%2F17514726114737.jpg%3Fquality%3D80%26strip%3Dall&w=3840&q=100)
![Cynthia Erivo's Fave Vocal Performances Include A Shocking Pick: Sisqó's 'Thong Song' [List]](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fall-logos-bucket.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fblackamericaweb.com.png&w=48&q=75){kind=small}
Black America Web
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Black America Web
Cynthia Erivo's Fave Vocal Performances Include A Shocking Pick: Sisqó's 'Thong Song' [List]
Known for her powerhouse pipes and commanding stage presence, Cynthia Erivo has long been celebrated as one of this generation's most gifted vocalists. When Entertainment Weekly (EW) asked the Tony, Emmy, and Grammy winner to name her top seven vocal performances of all time, her list included an unexpected — yet hilarious, heartfelt and relatable— nod to early 2000s R&B. Check out her list inside. Erivo sat down with EW to share her favorite vocal performances, and we were pleased to find Sisqó's 'Thong Song' amongst the top seven. 'I'm going to get in trouble for this one,' Erivo joked in the video interview, before defending the flamboyant, falsetto-filled track. 'Why do you need to sing like this when singing about a thong? That key change? The commitment? It is a good vocal.' Her choices spanned genres and generations, reflecting her love for storytelling through song, dynamic vocal technique, and unfiltered emotion. From gospel-rooted legends to pop titans and Broadway icons, Erivo's list offers a masterclass in vocal expression — with a little levity along the way. Here's the full list of Cynthia Erivo's seven favorite vocal performances: Cynthia Erivo's Fave Vocal Performances Include A Shocking Pick: Sisqó's 'Thong Song' [List] was originally published on 1. Sisqo – 'Thong Song' Source:YouTube Erivo called this pick 'a praise break.' With its dramatic runs, belted high notes, and sheer dedication to a wild premise, she praised Sisqó's vocal performance as both technically impressive and gloriously over-the-top. 2. Whitney Houston – 'Porgy and Bess' Medley Source:YouTube Erivo highlighted Houston's classical poise and gospel soul in this medley performance, emphasizing her stunning emotional control and interpretive brilliance. 3. Jennifer Holliday – 'And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going' Source:YouTube A staple of Broadway greatness, Holliday's original Dreamgirls performance remains a gold standard. 'You can hear the pain,' Erivo said. 'It makes you feel something.' 4. Jazmine Sullivan – 'Home' (age 11) Source:YouTube Erivo spotlighted a school performance of The Wiz by a very young Sullivan. 'At that age, with that kind of power? Unbelievable,' she marveled. 5. Aretha Franklin – 'Dr. Feel Good' Source:YouTube 'She was having the time of her life,' Erivo said, praising Franklin's soul, sass, and vocal control in this spirited performance. 6. Luther Vandross – 'A House Is Not a Home' Source:YouTube Calling it one of the most emotionally honest performances ever, Erivo described it as 'an unraveling in real time.' 7. Beyoncé – 'Resentment' Source:YouTube Bey's vocal dexterity and pain-soaked delivery earned her a final spot. 'It's controlled, but you feel every word,' Erivo said. Cynthia's list is proof that vocal greatness can be found in both church pews and club bangers — thong songs included. Be sure to check out the full video here.
Vancouver Sun
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Vancouver Sun
Library of Congress acquires Stephen Sondheim's papers and manuscripts
When Stephen Sondheim visited the Library of Congress in 1993, he saw something that stopped him in his tracks. Mark Horowitz, a senior music specialist at the library, had prepared a selection of historical scores from its collection – including works by Brahms and Rachmaninoff – to show the acclaimed composer and lyricist. 'The last thing I showed him was Gershwin's manuscript for 'Porgy and Bess,'' Horowitz said. 'That's when he started to cry.' The Library of Congress announced Wednesday that it has acquired the papers of the late composer, who died in 2021. Manuscripts and documents charting the creation of some of the most iconic and beloved musicals of the past 50-plus years – including 'Company,' 'Into the Woods' and 'Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street' – will now sit alongside 'Porgy and Bess' in the library's permanent collection. Plan your next getaway with Travel Time, featuring travel deals, destinations and gear. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Travel Time will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. Sondheim's music and lyrics will be available for public viewing July 1, while the remaining letters, notes and more will be accessible later this summer. The treasure trove of notebooks, sheet music and letters illuminates the craft behind the eight-time Tony winner's relentless reinvention of the musical. 'When it comes to theater makers in America in the last century, he's the Shakespeare,' said Matthew Gardiner, the artistic director of Arlington's Signature Theatre, which is known for its productions of Sondheim's musicals. 'It's so special to have these documents and lyrics and poems to see his process. [It's] a celebration of a life's work that changed an art form.' The library's acquisition of Sondheim's materials was decades in the making. Shortly after joining its music department, Horowitz arranged the show-and-tell with Sondheim, partially to persuade the composer to donate his manuscripts and letters to the institution. 'After that meeting, he said he was going to change his will,' Horowitz said. 'He sent me a letter with a blowup of the language he put in his will about his papers coming to the library. I felt like, yes, I could breathe a sigh of relief now that [was] done.' Three months ago, boxes containing nearly 5,000 items began arriving at the library's Madison Building. The treasures included the program for 'By George,' a musical Sondheim wrote in high school, and documents from the creation of more celebrated musicals, such as 40 pages of potential rhymes for the song 'A Little Priest' from 'Sweeney Todd.' Even for a Sondheim fan like Horowitz, sorting through these notes and pages of sheet music was overwhelming. The papers, he said, illustrate the painstaking energy that went into a Sondheim composition. 'I'm staggered and stunned by how bloody much effort he put into everything – the craft behind it,' Horowitz said. 'He'll have a finished song, he'll have a complete piano vocal score for the song in his hand, and then there'll be 20 pages of typescripts of the lyrics. He's still refining it and still changing it every day. It's like he's never happy or satisfied. It's always, 'What can I do to make this better?' And it's impossible to make that better!' Many of Sondheim's collaborators and inspirations in the Broadway world have left their papers and manuscripts to the Library of Congress. The New York City native follows his mentor Oscar Hammerstein II, whose family bequeathed sheet music and other papers related to 'Oklahoma!' and 'The Sound of Music' to the library. Leonard Bernstein, who collaborated with Sondheim on 'West Side Story,' began donating manuscripts while he was still alive. 'There's sort of this fantasy that [when] we leave at night and lock the doors behind us, we think: Are these collections murmuring to each other? Are they saying 'Hey, Steve! How are you doing?'' Horowitz said. 'The most gratifying thing is for the researchers, because we know it makes their research richer, because they can come here and look at Sondheim but then see the relationships between the other people.' Despite his ubiquity as a composer for the stage, Sondheim was a cultural omnivore, as evidenced by some of the recently acquired papers. Notes for 'Sooner or Later,' an Oscar-winning number that Sondheim wrote for Warren Beatty's 'Dick Tracy,' sit in the library's collection next to sheet music for a jingle he wrote for 'The Simpsons.' For aficionados like Gardiner, the richness of the acquisition lies in the drafts of Sondheim's musicals. The composer's process is fully on display, whether it be in the various versions of 'I'm Still Here' from 'Follies' or a reprise that was cut from 'Company.' Gardiner, who has directed or choreographed productions of beloved works such as 'Passion' and Sondheim's only Pulitzer Prize winner, 'Sunday in the Park With George,' plans to visit the library straight away. 'They've already promised to let me come take a look,' he said. 'We're very lucky to have the resource so close. I'm sure we will use it many, many times to inspire new interpretations, deepen our dramaturgical insight and to honor Sondheim as best we possibly can. I know there will be a meaningful relationship with that collection.' There's a reason revivals and revues have kept Sondheim's work on stages across the country. 'He's changed the audience members' lives because he's done what all great artists do, which is capture the way we think and feel about things,' Horowitz said. 'He's able to put words and musical emotions behind these things [that] makes them universal in a way that they hadn't been before.'
