Brian Stokes Mitchell playlist

Ezio Pinza

Brian Stokes Mitchell sang up a storm at Sanders Theatre on Friday night. He showed his remarkable vocal and stylistic (not to mention acting) range throughout, though my guess is he would have had the audience in the palm of his hand even had he chosen to sing nursery rhymes with his mouth full of sunflower seeds.

My favorite juxtaposition of styles was the transition from the full-bore Some Enchanted Evening a la the great Ezio Pinza (looking slick, above), to a finger snapping take on The Best Is Yet to Come in which he nailed Tony Bennet's (1962) delivery of the song's title: The-BEST-Is-YET-to-COME-and-BABE-won't-it-be-fiiine....It takes chops to negotiate that turn, brothah.

Here is his set list, imperfectly annotated by yours truly:

Some Enchanted Evening (from South Pacific, Rodgers and Hammerstein)
The Best is Yet to Come (Music by Cy Coleman, lyrics by Carolyn Leigh)
Wheels of a Dream (Composer, Stephen Flaherty)
Love for Sale (Composer, Cole Porter)
So in Love (Composer, Cole Porter, from Kiss Me, Kate)
This Nearly Was Mine (from South Pacific, Rodgers and Hammerstein)
I Was There
Bein' Green/Hooray for Tom (Yes, that Bein' Green, written by Joe Raposo)
New Words
'30s and '40s medley

Encores:
Some Other Time (Composer, Leonard Bernstein, from On The Town)
The Impossible Dream (Music by Mitch Leigh, lyrics by Joe Darion)
How Long Has This Been Going On? (George and Ira Gershwin)

Three final notes:

1) How Long Has This Been Going On? is humorous choice for a closer, but it would be a funnier third encore if the show was longer than a perfectly reasonable, but hardly lengthy 90 minutes. "How Long Has This Been Going On? Since 8 o'clock, why?" It's not like I want him to wear out his voice, or anything, I'm just sayin'.

2) Our crack programming staff tells me Mr. Mitchell's next gig is/was a fundraiser for his son's preschool. Aaww. For the playlist, I recommend keeping The Best Is Yet to Come, though I might reconsider Love for Sale.

3) The Celebrity Series presented Ezio Pinza at Symphony Hall four times back in the '40s. I wonder if he ever sang at a pre-school fundraiser...?