Urban Eye

Life in the cabaret

by Michelle Chihara

MASTER CLASS: Erv Raible and Ellie Ellsworth show the way for those looking to make it in the world of dimly lit piano bars.

In these days of Celine Dion, singing has become a kind of Olympic sport: you get points for style, but it's really about nailing the triple back flip, so to speak. Despite the rewards of being a belter, however, a dedicated band of singers and actors are keeping the flame of subtlety and phrasing alive. They call themselves cabaret artists, and they are a tenacious bunch, particularly here in Boston. Having earned a lively local following and formed an official organization (the Boston Association for Cabaret Artists), they have now lured the traveling auditions for cabaret's most important nine-day master class to make a stop here for the second year in a row.

The Eugene O'Neill Cabaret Symposium is a rite of passage for those looking to make it in the world of dimly lit piano bars. Last year, five Boston locals won "fellowships" to the annual symposium. This year, each of the dozen local artists auditioning is hoping for that windfall. "From my perspective, Boston has a very lively, ever-growing scene," says Ellie Ellsworth, the O'Neill's artistic director.

Ellsworth, who presided over the auditions held at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education in Harvard Square, is a ball of kinetic energy in black leggings, black flats, and a blue sweater. She starts people out easy. "You have a wonderful, smoky, butterscotch tone to your voice," she says to one hopeful; "Wow! She's in show business!" after another performance. But then she cuts to the chase. "Don't perform for us. Have a conversation with us. Let the singing get less planned. Don't go back into the phrasing that you practiced a million times at home. Live it."

Ellsworth's blunt personal questions would land her in court in a corporate setting, but auditions are not interviews. In an art form based on creating an intimate, almost conspiratorial, relationship with your audience, your ability to be vulnerable is key. Cabaret auditions, it seems, have little to do with singing. "We assume you're a good singer, that you have the notes and the polish," Ellsworth tells one candidate. "We want to see your soul."

Baring one's soul within the confines of chorus verse, it turns out, is not easy. Pamela Enders, a practicing Boston psychologist who says she's "resolving a midlife crisis" through cabaret, is attempting to do just that with a song by Irving Berlin called "You Can Have Him." It's standard American musical fare, a forlorn woman singing about her devotion to her husband, sung to the Other Woman.

Enders, tall and stately in flowing black skirt and scarf, sings it the first time through with stagy bitterness. "I don't want him," she spits. Ellsworth stops her. "Don't do the face thing. Don't do on your face what's happening in your heart, it's not necessary." Enders looks momentarily paralyzed. Erv Raible, a New York cabaret impresario and one of the master teachers from the O'Neill, reminds her to breathe.

The accompanist starts the song's opening chords again, and Raible gets up and whispers in Enders's ear ("Erv is the horse whisperer," one of the fellows tells me). Enders seems flustered at first, but then raises her eyebrows. She seems to understand.

Because he's not the man for me, she sings. All I ever wanted was to . . .

Erv, nodding, places his hands on both sides to stabilize Enders's neck. The song continues: I'd close the window while he soundly slept. Then I'd raid the icebox where the food is kept. "Pose the question," Ellsworth is coaxing, "did you or did you not do those things?"

I'd fix the breakfast that would please him most, eggs and coffee, some apricot juice and some buttered toast . . .

Whatever Erv has whispered suddenly works. Enders's new rendition of the song answers Ellsworth's question: without a doubt, she has clearly been buttering that toast, every day, for years. She has transformed from a woman going through the motions of jealous rage into a woman grieving for the comforting routines of her way of life. Ellsworth turns to me and, fluttering her fingers and running them up and down her arms, indicates that Enders has given her the chills.

Enders does not cry, although other auditioners do, and she may not even make the final O'Neill cut. But her chilling moment with the toast, it seems, is what cabaret is all about.

Out of the 12 auditioners in Boston, at least two are now guaranteed spots at the Eugene O'Neill Cabaret Symposium. More Boston artists will audition in New York later this month. At least 200 people will audition nationwide this year for 35 spots.