Maria Friedman in Conversation

This evening (one of a series of musical theatre In Conversations) took place in a well tiered 270 seat auditorium with what looked to be a full house. The front row being at stage/ground level. Piano stage right, conversation chairs stage left and Maria sang centre stage. I was sitting 2nd row centre. A perfect seat as Maria sang just directly in front of me. The first hour consisted of Neil Marcus asking questions about her experience with each of the composers in turn and Maria spoke at length about how they met and he memorable experiences and sang a couple of their songs. Sorry I cannot remember which ones - the short term memory for detail is not so good these days! I also cannot remember the name of her accompanist who sang a number from something he is writing for Theatre Clwyd and Chichester. Maria also mentioned her time at the National in Ghetto and sang a song from that and mentioned how her father told her that her Grandmother was born in Vilnius where the Ghetto was. (I was lucky enough to have seen that production in 1989).

Maria was sipping lemon and honey as she had a cold which fortunately only had a slight effect on her singing voice.

There followed about twenty minutes of Q&A (sensible knowledgeable questions!) and then a couple more songs finishing with "Children Will Listen".

A very enjoyable evening. Ninety minutes over far too quickly, but at least it meant I could get one of the last Overground trains before the replacement bus service took over!

I have to mention the loos. Unisex, all cubicles and spotlessly clean.