National Symphony Orchestra: The Broadway Tenors, CD

Seventeen years ago I asked my friend Betsy Friday [picture left], to help me create a concert evening called The Broadway Tenors.  I met Betsy when we were dancing partners shooting a Coke-a-Cola commercial in 1980.  Betsy had retired from performing, started the Betsy Friday Company and started producing. Our idea from the beginning was to have a group of guys flow in and out of the concert, depending on availability. The goal was to maintain the highest level of talent with every combination of singers.  This framework has worked really well. We also brought in Michael Dansicker to develop special arrangements and Barry Kleinbort to help with the connective dialogue.  David Loud, Phil Reno and Jim Rice have all contributed outstanding arrangements over the years.  Phil Reno, thank you for the generosity of your time while recording this CD and your talent and patience on the road.  The œjuice will always be waiting. In the fall of 2000, The Broadway Tenors had their first public performance at the Naples Performing Arts Center with Hugh Panaro, Alan Campbell and myself.  As more dates were booked, and everyones schedules became more complicated, we started adding new singers.  Along with the Tenors on this CD, I want to thank Brian dArcy James, Hugh Panaro, Gavin Creel, Ron Bohmer, Stephen Bogardus, David Burnham, George Dvorsky, Brian Lane Green, Kevin Spirtas, Sal Viviano, Jonathan Dokuchitz, and Matt Farnsworth for lending their beautiful voices and dedication over the years.  I also want to thank Michael David, of The Dodgers, and Mark Sendroff, for helping Betsy and I sort through the growing pains of a new venture.  To Sam Ellis, Reggie Barton, Don Meyers, John Boswell and Philip Fortenberry, I thank you. In 2001, I was in London rehearsing Kiss Me Kate, when I received a phone call that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center.  We watched television from a pub around the corner as the world changed forever.  Everything came to a halt.  And then my dear friend Betsy was diagnosed with Leukemia.  After a difficult struggle with this horrible disease, she died July 22, 2002 at the age of 44. Determined to keep the Tenors going, I enlisted Matthew Inge, to book the Tenors in the symphony world.  Matthew, now The Broadway Tenors general manager, added a much-needed multimedia aspect to the concert.  No one can organize and schedule like Matthew, and Im very grateful! Which brings us to the present.  My friend Levi Walker put together a 30 second television commercial, which I put on Facebook.  John Yap saw it and messaged me asking if Id be interested in doing a Broadway Tenors CD.  I was thrilled, and here it is!! Betsy was a beautiful woman with a spirit to match. She was a guiding force of The Broadway Tenors and I hope she would be proud.  I keep a picture of her on my desk, Betsy standing in a field of sunflowers. For your friendship and guidance, this is for you, Betsy.