More Theater Monda - Sarah Brightman A Christmas Symphony

We were given complimentary tickets to Sarah Brightman A Christmas Symphony for review purposes. Any and all opinions expressed here are our own

What: Sarah Brightman A Christmas Symphony 

Where: NJPAC

            1 Center St.

            Newark, NJ

When: This event took place on November 27, 2021

Sarah Brightman's voice is as clear and as beautiful as ever even more than thirty years after she first took on the role of Christine Daae in The Phantom of the Opera. The songs in her current concert tour are mostly Christmas music, of course, as indicated by the title of her tour. However, there is also a little opera and some other things thrown in as well. It was nice to hear her take on such songs as Vince Gill's "Colder Than Winter", Abba's "Arrival" and John Lennon's "So This Is Christmas". Highlights of the show included "Time to Say Goodbye" and the title song of Phantom of the Opera. It was especially good to hear her sing the latter. It's nice when performers embrace their past instead of shying away from it insisting that they have already been there and done that  and moving on without ever looking back. 

The concert was a bit of a fashion show as well as Ms. Brightman changed costumes frequently.  On the whole, her outfits did not seem that different from one another. They mostly consisted of an array of sparkly glittery princess-like dresses in a variety of different colors. In fact, all that costume changing didn't really seem necessary at all. It was much like when the host of an award show just keep changing outfits for no reason. Are people's attention spans so bad that we need to keep looking at different outfits on the same person or perhaps Ms. Brightman just has a lot of beautiful dresses that she just wanted to show off or make use of?  Sometimes, it makes sense when performers change costumes during a concert, in this case, it did not, especially because all the dresses seemed very similar.

Ms. Brightman had a great rapport with the audience, and they clearly loved her sometimes very vocally. A couple times during a break in the performance audience members called out to her even though it did not seem like the kind of concert where that sort of thing would happen. Each time it occurred, Ms. Brightman responded very graciously, however, and the shouting out did not phase her. 

All in all, it was a nice evening of music and Ms. Brightman is a talented performer with a lovely voice.

And that's our view. For more about Sarah Brightman's A Christmas Symphony tour and/or to find out when and if it will be coming to a city near you, visit sarahbrightman.com. To find out about upcoming events at NJPAC, visit www.njpac.org

Tune in tomorrow for Tips for Tuesday.