NiteLife Exchange (NLE) asks Peggy Schwartz (PS), Lynda Rodolitz (LR) Deborah Zecher (DZ) and Helane Blumfield (HB) of 4 Women 4 Stories Six Questions.
NLE: How did the collaborative force of 4 Women 4 Stories come about?
Peggy Schwartz (PS): Our show evolved from a discussion I had with members of the program committee of my synagogue on the North Fork of Long Island. I was asked to do a cabaret show as a community outreach/fundraiser with the original concept being the Jewish American songbook. After much research and thought, I decided to ask three wonderful fellow Jewish cabaret singers to join me. With the help of Lennie Watts, we came up with a concept that focuses on our lives and stories and is told almost totally with the music of Jewish American songwriters.
Lynda Rodolitz(LR): It was very simple, really—Peggy’s synagogue on Long Island asked her to put together entertainment for a benefit. She asked the three of us to join her and we had lots of ideas, but when we asked Lennie to be our director, everything changed. He helped us find a shape and an arc for the show, and it became more focused and complete than it had been in our minds.
Deborah Zecher (DZ): The show was born when Peggy Schwartz’s synagogue on the North Fork of Long Island asked her to put together a cabaret as a synagogue fund-raiser. She graciously invited the three of us to join her in the venture and we soon decided to really commit to the process by asking Lennie Watts to be our director and Bobby Peaco to be our music director. As we worked on the show, we began to get really excited about it and decided that we would bring it to Don’t Tell Mama for a NYC audience. Initially, it was each of us choosing a few songs and then adding a group song or two. With Lennie’s guidance and our own enthusiasm and commitment, the show grew to reflect the journeys our lives have taken, their similarities and differences. Lennie brilliantly adapted “I Want it All” from Baby to actually tell our lives’ stories and that became our opener.
Helane Blumfield (HB): Peggy was asked to do a show at her synagogue and she asked if we would do it with her…. the rest is “herstory”
NLE: Have any of you previously performed together? Have you supported each other’s Cabaret career over the years or is this a new found friendship?
PS: Some of us have performed together in group shows. This was the first show that we developed from scratch. Yes, we have all been supportive of each other’s careers over the past years but this collaboration has brought us much closer together.
LR: The NYC cabaret community, at least the part that is centered around MAC and the local clubs, is a very supportive and friendly group. We’ve all been in Lennie’s classes together, and many of us have done shows together through Lennie’s Arrangement Experience classes. I have seen all of the other women’s shows and they came to mine. We’re cabaret friends, which is why Peggy reached out to us.
DZ: We have all been students of Lennie over the past few years and that’s where we met. Several of us have done his Arrangement Experience classes which culminate in a show so we have actually performed together. I cherish these women, I am proud to call them my friends, and it’s my greatest joy to support their work and I am grateful for their support of my work. Four Women, Four Stories could easily be called Four Friends, Four Stories and that’s the bonus of working together on a shared project. We all came to cabaret from different worlds; I was a congregational rabbi for 32 years before I retired in 2014 and came to NY to devote the “second act’ of my life to cabaret.
HB: We have been fortunate enough to meet and perform in various cabaret classes together. The cabaret community is so supportive and very generous. It’s natural that deep friendships would develop. I am so grateful that they have.
NLE: How did you go about sourcing material for the show?
PS: Once our concept for the show was determined, we each brought in music that would be appropriate to tell our stories. Working with the amazing Lennie Watts and Bobby Peaco, we refined and expanded our choices. Lennie and Bobby were instrumental in creating some of the most powerful, personal moments of the show
LR: We noticed that many of our shows had songs written by Jewish writers, and that was our theme at first. We picked songs we knew and liked, and, for the most part, had performed before. Remember, this was originally just a small evening’s work. We collaborated on choosing the group songs and Booby Peaco created amazing yet learnable arrangements for us. It just grew organically, as most shows do. Throw out ideas, evaluate them, start again, etc…
DZ: We all brought three songs that we loved to be part of the show as our solos. Initially, the show was to feature only work by Jewish composers and it still mostly is but not exclusively Jewish songwriters. Then, we began to add some group numbers. One of them, America by Neil Diamond, had been part of Helane’s solo show but it eventually became one of our group numbers. It was Lennie who mined that song for its potential as the story of each of our family’s arrival in this country. We feel that it’s a very powerful moment in the show and our audience in May affirmed our feeling about it. The group numbers evolved from conversations that we had about the show and where we wanted to go with it.
HB: That’s a hard question. I always think of it as going to down a rabbit hole. Digging deeper and deeper until you find the material that can communicate your story.
NLE: Is the show different from your personal shows, or does it delve into something different and new?
PS: There is some overlapping in the music that we’ve sung before but, also, new material that reflects the overall theme of the show.
LR: I’ve sung all of my solo songs in other shows but I don’t usually do such directly autobiographical shows. We look at what’s different and what’s similar in our lives, and that’s a new direction for me, as is talking about my father’s immigrant roots.
DZ: I had just presented my debut show last May called On Purpose and it was a very personal show about my life as a wife, mother and rabbi and now, cabaret singer. So I took two of my solo songs from my show and chose a new one for my third song in our group show. For me, the show is a really interesting outgrowth from my debut show because this is about four women who share some similarities but whose lives have followed very different paths instead of a single life story.
HB: To me cabaret is always personal. This show is no different.
NLE: Is this show something that you see happening long term? Returning to Don’t Tell Mama in the future or taking it to other venues?
PS: We definitely hope to continue to perform this show. Another performance at DTM is certainly a possibility. We are looking at ways to take it on the road and reach a much wider audience and are already in discussions with a number of venues. We think it would do well in the NY metropolitan area and beyond.
LR: I don’t know that we are thinking about doing it a third time at Mama (we already did it at the Learning Experience, and on the North Fork of Long Island for the synagogue) but we are looking at the possibility of other venues. Some folks who saw out first show reached out for us to come to their communities, and our members have been looking into other possibilities. Now that Bobby Peaco has moved to Florida – he’s flying up for the September 18 show – there are several decisions to be made.
DZ: We would love for this show to have a life beyond the several performances we have scheduled. People have responded so positively and enthusiastically to the show and we have had several inquiries about traveling with the show to other communities. We would love to make that happen. We enjoy each other’s company and feel proud of what we have created. It would be a joy to share this work with others whether again at Don’t Tell Mama or elsewhere.
HB: Yes to both questions, fingers crossed.
NLE: What makes this project so special to each of you?
PS: This project has been a wonderful, inspiring experience for me. It is a great joy to work with other people to create something so real, so powerful and so meaningful.
LR: I don’t think I was the only one of us who was really taken aback by the reaction the audience had to this show. People came out in tears; people thanked us for telling our stories because we reflected their stories. It was very powerful and humbling. And I really enjoyed working with the women and all of our team on this collaboration—it was exciting and fun. Doing a group show has a different set of problems than doing a solo show, i.e. you have to listen to other people’s ideas—but that turned out to be quite a wonderful experience
DZ: I love doing my solo shows, whether it’s the show I did at Don’t tell Mama last year or the Jewish-themed shows that I take around the country to synagogues but there is an energy and synergy to working collaboratively that I adore. The process of creating a show is so exciting; sharing that joy with like-minded friends and colleagues is a blessing that I cherish. We speak a similar language. Lynda, Peggy and Helane are so talented that it’s inspiring to work with them! I also love this show because it resonates so profoundly with others. Whether you’ve lived a life similar to the ones we portray or it’s very different, everyone seems to find something of themselves in the themes we explore in the show. And finally, any chance to work with Lennie Watts and Bobby Peaco is special. Both of them brought something so brilliant to the process. Bobby’s arrangements suited us so beautifully and I have long marveled at Lennie’s ability to discern themes and a narrative arc from disparate pieces of music to create a beautiful and meaningful whole. I feel blessed by the entire experience!!
HB: The three other women!
4 Women 4 Stories plays at Don’t Tell Mama tomorrow, Wednesday September 18th at 7:00pm
For tickets, click here
Don’t Tell Mama is located at 343 W 46th St (between 8th & 9th Ave) New York, NY 10036 Tel: 212-757-0788 (after 4:00PM)
Leave a Reply