Audrey James, staff writer
Baseball Swing hails the attachment between baseball and music with a concert featuring more than 2,000 images and videos from the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum forming connections between the music played by the All-Star Baseball Jazz Band.
Baseball Swing is a musical that presents a nine-piece jazz band performing baseball hits such as “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” “Say Hey,” “Baseball Boogie” and “Knock It Out of the Park.” Sang by a quartet of singers, Adrian Zmed, Terri White, Terron Brooks and Angela Pupello, and an announcer, played by Fred Willard. The four singers also act out scenes during the entirety of the musical. From spectators in the stands to a batter getting ready to make a home-run, the actors play out all of the aspects of the game, making the audience feel like they’re in Dodger Stadium.
The musical is co-produced and co-commissioned by the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Baseball Music Project. The Baseball Music Project was founded by a group of professional musicians who are passionate baseball fans and hope to foster greater awareness of the cultural lineage and historical significance of music written about baseball.
Those who were weary of how entertaining the musical would be, because they aren’t captivated by the game of baseball, would have had a great time at the show with the array of cheerfully spirited singing dancing. With the light heartedness of the band’s jazz music and the spirit you’d expect from being in Dodger Stadium, Baseball Swing can be single handedly described as a jubilant musical that calls attention to the importance of baseball’s influence on Americans from the early 1900s. But is able to highlight the game with musical excellence that keeps even the youngest of audiences dancing in their seats.
Lou Moore, Executive Director of The Wallis, spoke to the Beverly Hills Patch about how the musical is able to entertain diverse audiences, from the youngest to the oldest members of a family with its kindred charm.
“Baseball Swing is weekend of concerts for the whole family to have fun and celebrate the great American pastime,” Moore said. “I was amazed to find that there are hundreds of songs written over the past decades about baseball and a few of the sport’s greatest players and we are happy to share a few of them with our audiences here at The Wallis.
Baseball Swing, a part of the Jack Elliott Family Concert Series, had four performances from April 4-6, 2014, in the Bram Goldsmith Theater in the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts.