"Spectacular and influential cabaret stars Andrea Marcovicci and Julie Wilson must make room for Anne Kerry Ford.  This magnificent singer reaches to the bottom of her vocal range to pull out emotional moments that soar beyond cabaret into moving theatre."  LA Weekly

Broadway veteran Anne Kerry Ford first performed the songs of Kurt Weill in concert with WDR’s 27 piece Big Band in Cologne (at Philharmonic Hall) and Dusseldorf, Germany and Liège, Belgium, in 2000 as a tribute to Kurt Weill’s centenary under the musical direction of jazz legend Roger Kellaway. The Cologne Stadt Anziger pronounced it "a huge success", and Ford’s CD of this concert (“Weill”) has been received with acclaim.

October 30th marks the return to 142 Throckmorton’s of Anne Kerry Ford, who appeared  there earlier this year as opening act for her husband, lauded guitarist Robben Ford. Anne Kerry Ford is a devotee of the music of Kurt Weill and is noted as one of the foremost interpreters of Weill’s music. She also appeared in the Broadway production of Weill’s The Threepenny Opera starring Sting.

After presenting her Weill show in concert and cabaret settings for the past decade, Anne's vision of doing this show as a theatrical piece is being fulfilled in collaboration with the 142  Throckmorton Theatre, a 300 seat theater in Mill Valley, California, north of San Francisco. Resident scenic designer for the theater Steve Coleman designed sets to transport the show into an abstract "story-theater" setting in which Ford, no longer bound to the microphone, can interpret the Weill songs in a more physical way, drawing on her extensive theater and dance background.

The wide variety of music from both Weill’s German and American songbooks (dramatic, romantic, humorous, political, lyrical, satirical, passionate and poignant) includes selections from Lady in the Dark, Knickerbocker Holiday, Lost in the Stars, One Touch of Venus, Street Scene, Love Life, Where Do We Go from Here?, Threepenny Opera, Happy End, Marie Galante, and Johnny Johnson.  All songs will be sung in English by Ford and her pianist John Boswell . There will be an appearance by a special guest, Tony-nominee Brian Lane Green.
 

Kurt Weill (1900-50)

The contribution of Kurt Weill to German and American musical culture includes early concertos, chorales, cantatas and theatrical collaborations with Bertholt Brecht, with whom he worked on The Threepenny Opera (1928), The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (1929) and Happy End (1929). In 1933 he left Germany for Paris, where he worked with Brecht again on the sung ballet The Seven Deadly Sins. Then in 1935 he moved to the USA, where he cut loose from the European art-music tradition and devoted himself wholeheartedly to composing for the Broadway stage with Langston Hughes, Ogden Nash, Maxwell Anderson, Ira Gershwin and Alan Jay Lerner, Ann Ronnell, among others.


Anne Kerry Ford, vocalist

Anne Kerry Ford, a graduate of The Juilliard School of Drama, is a favorite of the cabaret and concert stage, particularly as an interpreter of Kurt Weill’s music. Her version of  “Pirate Jenny” has become a youtube sensation; her recording of the song made USA TODAY”S playlist of “ten intriguing tracks” bearing this description: “Girl power brings memorable sturm and drang to the Brecht/Weill classic.". Ford appeared on Broadway in  “The Threepenny Opera” with Sting, and as an actress, she has a long resume of roles from Broadway and regional theater as well as television and film. As a singer, Anne has presented theatrical concerts at The Gardenia in Hollywood and at The Cafe Sabarsky in New York’s Neue Galerie, San Francisco’s Plush Room, Blues Alley in Washington DC, Wilson Center in Milwaukee, Scullers in Boston, Savor in St. Louis, The John Anson Ford Amphitheater and The Cinegrill in LA. and many other venues across the country. “L.A. Weekly” said of her Weill show: “Spectacular and influential cabaret stars Andrea Marcovicci and Julie Wilson must make room for Anne Kerry Ford. This magnificent singer reaches to the bottom of her vocal range to pull out emotional moments that  soar beyond cabaret into moving theatre.” Ford was the vocalist with WDR’s Big Band for Weill’s centenary in Germany, a concert recorded and released as her highly acclaimed CD “Weill”, which,  in addition to her two previous solo CD releases, was produced by her husband, multi-Grammy nominee Robben Ford.

John Boswell, pianist

John sang and played in the vocal trio “Wiseguys”, “Three Men And A Baby...Grand”, as well as serving as musical director for Judy Collins, Andy Williams, Bob Newhart, John Davidson, Anne Kerry Ford, Brian Lane Green, Linda Purl, and Lee Lessack. He has appeared on numerous television shows, including “The Tonight Show”, “The Joan Rivers Show”, “Good Morning America”, “CBS This Morning”, and “The Today Show”. John serves as musical director for Maude Maggart and stars with Susie Mosher in the comedy cult hit “Cashino”, selected as one of the top ten cabaret acts of 2008 by TIME OUT NY. John has seven CDs of original piano instrumental music on the Hearts Of Space label.