Post by jptheprofessor on Nov 16, 2006 19:42:34 GMT -5
STYX & THE CONTEMPORARY YOUTH ORCHESTRA – ONE WITH EVERYTHING (New Door Records) Earlier this year, on May 25, Styx became the latest band to “rock the orchestra,” joining forces with Cleveland’s nonprofit Contemporary Youth Orchestra for a special concert at Cleveland’s Blossom Music Center. Released in conjunction with a concert DVD and forthcoming PBS television special, One With Everything captures much of this special concert collaboration. Directed by Liza Grossman and comprised of a 115-piece orchestra and 56-member chorus featuring student musicians from 40 schools in northeastern Ohio, the Contemporary Youth Orchestra embraces and fleshes out Styx classics and select other material through most of the album’s course. The performance and album largely succeed because Styx’s brand of pomp rock lends itself easily to orchestral expansion; thus the orchestra helps Styx give canons such as “Blue Collar Man (Long Nights),” “Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man),” “Too Much Time On My Hands,” “Crystal Ball,” “Miss America” and “Renegade” a deeper, more majestic scope. Along the way, Styx and the orchestra also join forces on the group’s hit rendition of the Beatles’ “I Am the Walrus,” a version of Willie Dixon’s “It Don’t Make Sense (You Don’t Make Peace),” and a new song, “Everything, All the Time.” Perhaps designed to serve as a sort of intermission between halves of concert footage, Styx includes one new studio track in the midst of the album, the escalating and ethereal “Just Be.” The live concert sound is big and vast, with the orchestra filling in around the band’s arrangements; the atmosphere is jubilant and charged, as rock band, orchestra and audience elevate each other and take the evening’s energy higher as the album progresses. The combination of Styx rocking the orchestra and the Contemporary Youth Orchestra orchestrating Styx’s music makes for an intriguing and satisfying listen. One With Everything captures the magic of a special evening, and offers some of Styx’s most popular works performed in a different light.