Grey Gardens
At first glance, a mentally deranged elderly woman and her equally afflicted middle-aged daughter might not seem the likeliest central characters in a musical that draws rave reviews from both high minded critics and a flock of Broadway theater goers, but there you go: after concluding a highly successful off-Broadway run in 2006 Grey Gardens played to sold out crowds during its season on the Great White Way. Based on the 1975 documentary film of the same name by Albert and David Maysles, Grey Gardens explores dementia and family dysfunctionality with wit and humor, but its creators, Michael Korie (lyrics), Doug Wright (book) and Scott Frankel (music), impale neither Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale- the aunt of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis-her daughter, also named Edith, or the cast that surrounds them and fleshes out the story of how this wealthy pair fell into squalor in their once magnificent Long Island mansion. Treated with compassion, but also from an intellectually dispassionate perspective, (a feat which, in its artful mirroring of the documentary film medium, is perhaps the greatest achievement of Grey Gardens), the characters disintegrate before our eyes but manage to retain our affection throughout the process.
Scott Frankel graduated from Yale University in 1985. During his time at Yale, Frankel met Doug Wright and also became a member of the fabled Skull and Bones society. Would revealing the secrets of this clandestine community force Frankel to liquidate his confessor? “Nah, things have changed since the old days. In fact, the main benefits of belonging to Skull and Bones are no longer in place. Fifty or sixty years ago they picked the captain of the football team, the valedictorian, those kinds of people. I was just a music major- how things had changed by the time I got to Yale!”
Frankel grew up in Cleveland playing the piano and being attracted to some of the great dramatic composers-Mahler, Strauss, Puccini-as well as Earth, Wind and Fire, Steely Dan, and Blood, Sweat and Tears. After graduating from Yale Frankel migrated to Manhattan, where he became a session keyboard player and accompanist. Prior to Grey Gardens, Scott Frankel and Michael Korie collaborated on two musicals, Doll, and Meet Mister Future. Some composers look to slap bravura songs into the jowls of their actors, but Frankel clearly sees music as an agent of character development. Is it hard not to look for those moments when a hit song will emerge? “Michael and I almost always write songs by the ‘lyric first’ model,” says Frankel. “His lyrics are incredibly specific and attuned to the dramaturgical needs of the scene and the character. That said, I know that Michael does at least attempt to create a lyric (or two) that has the potential to be lifted from the show and exist independently from it. It’s a terribly difficult thing to pull off—micro and macro at the same time, if you will. I hope that “Another Winter In a Summer Town,” and “Will You?’ might both find their way beyond the confines of Grey Gardens.”
One of the great accomplishments of the Grey Gardens score, which was recently re-released by PS Classics, stems from the financial realities that creative theatrical teams often have to contend with in the modern era. The powers that be mandated that Frankel and orchestrator Bruce Coughlin work with a pit orchestra of nine players. The palette of colors that Frankel and Coughlin were able to draw out of this diminutive ensemble is remarkable. Rather than turn over simple lead sheets, Frankel sketched out detailed arrangement ideas across five staves and handed them off to Coughlin. “Scott’s scores were very specific,” says Coughlin, one of the most sought after arrangers in New York. “He’s a master of the Art Tatum runs, and I was able to keep a lot of his piano parts in the score. I brought counter melodies to the score, but I never heard it as being over burdened with fills.
“Writing for nine players was a real challenge, one that I enjoyed. When you’ve got full sections of brass, strings and winds, you can write in blocks of harmony, but with so few players it’s more about individual lines. I had to make sure each interval was satisfying. The result is something of a chamber opera piece, where the band envelops the singer to create a sense of size. Otherwise the band can feel tiny.” Of Coughlin, Scott Frankel says, “Bruce is an extraordinary musician, the opposite of the ‘orchestrator as auteur.’He works from the inside out, taking the essence and the ethos of the writing and enhancing it. No one working today has a finer ability to make a small ensemble sound like a bigger band- his mastery of colors and voicing is incredible.”
Coughlin spent some time writing jingles before his theatrical career took off. He also jumped into the computer game early on and was the author of Clicktracks, a Mac program he wrote in 1986 that was distributed by Passport Designs. If you want his detailed thoughts on the role of an orchestrator, Coughlin lays them out on his website, www.brucecoughlin.com.
The original off-Broadway cast album was produced by Tommy Krasker and released on his label, PS Classics. Several new songs were written for the Broadway run, others deleted, and the decision was made to return to Avatar Studios to track the new material with Steve Epstein as producer. Epstein’s long time colleague Richard King recorded these songs and re-mixed the entire album.
Epstein, no stranger to Mix readers, attracted Bruce Coughlin’s attention through his production of another cast album, Light In The Piazza, which was written by Adam Guettel. “Coincidentally, Adam also went to Yale and was a member of Skull and Bones,” says Epstein, “and Bruce contributed some additional orchestrations to Light In The Piazza. Bruce dropped me a line and asked if I would be interested in producing the Grey Gardens album.
“Tommy Krasker drew some beautiful performances out of the cast during the initial recording sessions, which were also conducted at Avatar speaking of conducting, it needs to be pointed out that Lawrence Yurman is the Musical Director and conductor in the pit and on the sessions, and his contributions to the establishment of proper balance was critical during the recording process.
“I met Scott when I was invited to see the show for the first time. I had already listened to the recording of the off Broadway version by that time and found it very affecting. Scott has the rare ability to write music of substance rather than saccharine that is nonetheless appealing to a wide audience. I found the show very moving and thought it would be a great project to be involved with.
“Scott and I had to be sure we were in sync though. Musicals are an interesting genre. When you record a musical you have to make some decisions. Cast albums often end up sounding like karaoke, with a singer slapped on top of an arrangement. Opera recordings, on the other hand, allow the singers to be cushioned against the orchestra, and at times be enveloped by its textures. When opera singers get ‘lost’ in the orchestra the result is often heightened excitement.
“Cast recordings are a hybrid between pop and classical. Operas are generally recorded in a hall, and the environment plays a great part in the overall picture of the final product. When you step into a studio to record a cast album, especially with the slender number of players we used, you’re tasked with the assignment of creating the sound scape.
“We used Avatar’s Studio C because that’s where the original cast recordings were made and we wanted to establish a continuous sound. C’s a small room- I generally work in larger spaces-but it’s a good sounding room. It has several iso booths, and we placed Tim McLafferty’s drums and percussion instruments in one of them, and the singers in another. This booth held five singers.
“I don’t like to use isolation booths as a rule- they add an unpleasant resonance, even when you add loads of reverb (which introduces another problem) to cover it up. But we close-miked the singers and it worked quite well. We gobo’d Christine Ebersole and Mary Lousie Wilson, who had extensive solo parts, to impart a little more isolation to them.
“Richard tracked the new material onto a Pro Tools system that was operated by Bart Migal. We usually record at 24/88.2, but this time we worked at 24/44.1. Scott, Bruce and I chose takes after the session and Bart edited them in an offline session. Richard and I mixed all of the material, new and old, on a Neve console in Room 311 of the now defunct Sony Studios.”
“Steve Epstein is a dream,” says Scott Frankel, “a record producer who is sensitive, musical, tasteful, and very much interested in the composer’s viewpoint and intent. Many producers come in and try to put their own imprint on a recording, even if it is at odds with the material itself. Steve is a true collaborator, and is refreshingly free of ego. Whoever has the best idea in the control room at any given moment wins, and that’s how it should be. I consider myself tremendously fortunate that he is a passionate advocate of the score to Grey Gardens.”
Christine Ebersole’s virtuoustic performance-she plays “Big Edie” in the opening act, which takes place in 1941, and her daughter “Little Edie,” in the second act, which transpires in 1973-landed her a leading actress Tony award. Mary Louise Wilson also copped a featured actress statue for her performance as the faraway, elderly Big Edie of Act Two. The Grey Gardens cast delivered its final Broadway performance on July 29, 2007. Plans are currently being developed for a London production.
Appeared in Mix January 2007
