Music Monday - Movin' Out

Hey, whadda ya know! I actually have something musical to talk about for Music Monday!

This weekend Jen and I finally got to see the Billy Joel/Twyla Tharp "musical" Movin' Out at the National Theatre. It's not really a musical, though... it's dance set to Billy Joel's music. And although it's supposed to tell a story of the main characters over 20-some years, it's pretty tough to tell a coherent story when you're building that storyline by stringing together songs that were written over at least as many years.

That was really my big complaint -- the storyline was there and you could follow it, but it was pretty cheesy, especially the "resolution" near the end. But the performance itself was excellent. The band was amazing, and it was fun to hear how some of Billy's songs were tweaked a bit to fit the storyline. (If you don't know, a live band performs Billy's songs on a catwalk above the stage, while the dancers perform below.) The dancing was also amazing, especially the lead character, Eddie. Jen felt there was too much dance for the sake of dance (as opposed to dance in an attempt to tell a story) and too much ballet-style dancing in general. Still, if you see the show you have to go expecting to see a dance performance, not a musical. And don't expect "Dancing with the Stars" either.

All in all, I was very impressed with all the performers, and it was fun to hear Billy's music performed by someone else, with great arrangements and a killer horn section. Was it worth the $94 per ticket (with service fees)? Probably not. And I certainly wouldn't pay to see it again. But I'm certainly glad I got to see it once.