From the catchy opening featuring High Society's Swell Party, suitably spiced with up-to-date political witticisms, through an outstanding and hilarious ten minute Phantom, to the concluding Fats Waller medley, the performers who are Combo Fiasco entranced the packed Thursday night audience with laughter, poignancy, sadness, joys...
The performers were pianist and singer Tony McGill, pianist and singer Shaun Murphy and actress and singer Sharon Millerchip. The three met whilst performing in the Melbourne production of Phantom Of the Opera. It's one of those rare moments in showbussiness, when a group of performers suddenly find that they "click" together and wham - something extraordinary is born.
Some particular highlights for me were a superb arrangement of Cy Coleman's The Rhythm of Life which highlighted the group's excellent sense of harmonic balance and dynamic range, a wonderful Kander and Ebb duo featuring the songs Sometimes a Day Goes By and Marry Me and of course the amazing condensed version of Phantom which I mentioned earlier and which still evokes a spontaneous chuckle through the day.
Each of the three performers also chose songs for individual performance and in particular, Shaun Murphy's version's of Leon Russell's Superstar and These Are the Games People Play from Falsetto's were outstanding. Shaun's tenor voice has a huge dynamic range - something that he uses most intelligently by his sparing and therefore highly effective use of triple forte.
Sharon sang an effective and moving rendition of Randy Crawford's Almars, whilst Tony McGill opted for amusing, anecdotal trifles in pieces such as The Waiter, the Porter and the Upstairs Maid.
In a week where I've also seen an outstanding preview of a show featuring all original material, Combo Fiasco's eclectic offering of non-original material shone very brightly indeed. A more entertaining evening, you'll be hard pressed to find.
Originally published in Muse Magazine (Canberra), November 1997
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