The Anderson Brothers Play Irving Berlin

 “Irving Berlin has no place in American music — he is American music.”  Jerome Kern.

The Anderson Brothers’ tutorial entertainments offer almost as much information as they do music. Will writes an illuminating biographical script augmented by film clips. Peter creates arrangements true to songwriter intention. The twins play saxophone, clarinets and flutes, beaming at one another during solos. Shows are amiable. And skilled.

Israel Beilin (1888-1989) was born in a small shtetl on the edge of Siberia, the youngest of eight children. When the family watched Cossacks burn the house down, six of them (older ones were independent) fled across central Europe, eventually sailing for America. At Ellis Island, where their last name was misspelled, Irving’s 46 year-old father told authorities he was a butcher (not a cantor), feeling the profession was more employable. He was employed by a kosher meat market and taught Hebrew. Mrs. Beilin became a midwife.

Left: Public Domain. Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
Right: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, NYWT&S Collection, [reproduction number, e.g., LC-USZ62-90145]

The eight of them took up residence at Russian Jewish “Central” on the Lower East Side. Other families arriving in that wave included those of the Gershwins, Sophie Tucker, Al Jolson, and Louis B. Mayer (MGM). Israel/Izzy started selling newspapers at eight in order to help support the family, but at 14 when his father died, the boy left school and home to work full time. Without education or training, Izzy turned to singing. He busked on the Bowery, got a job at Tony Pastor’s Music Hall plugging songs, then became a performing waiter.

In 1911, at 21 years old, “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” (the opening number tonight) propelled Berlin to the top of his profession. The song is not actually a rag (critic Richard Corliss calls it a march), but it bears the infectious, syncopated  energy of one. George Gershwin said it was “the first real American musical work.” In fact, it didn’t become a success until its second theatrical outing.

Will and Peter Anderson

Wonderfully selected clips show the Muppets, Jeeves and Wooster (Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie), Young Frankenstein (Gene Wilder and Peter Boyle) and others singing Berlin songs.

Molly Ryan renders “Blue Skies” with what appears to be organic swing. Vocal is easy, smooth and satiny. She warmly relates to the audience. Flute and clarinet skate around one another. The night before vaudeville star Belle Baker was about to open in Rodgers and Hart’s Betsy, she asked Berlin for help with a showstopper. In less than 24 hours, he finished “Blue Skies.” When the song was introduced, it got over 20 standing ovations. (The musical flopped.)

Throughout his entire career, Berlin could neither read nor write music. He had an assistant who acted as scribe while he plunked out notes only on black keys and eventually bought a piano that transposed.

A Dixieland arrangement of “All By Myself” features Bria Skonberg just back from performing with
The New York Pops. Joined by tenor sax and clarinet playing all around the tune, a woeful, foot-tapping version emerges. Bass solo by Neal Miner deserves both terms – hot and cool. Trumpet responds as if muted – it’s not. Clarinet decorates. Piano is dreamy. Percussion is low key.

Molly Ryan, Bria Skonberg, Will Anderson, Peter Anderson

Excerpts from such films as Top Hat, Easter Parade, Coconuts, Call Me Madame, and White Christmas continue to illustrate a variety of performers and projects. Berlin’s manager said he’d write a complete song every day. “I sweat blood between 3 and 6 a.m. many mornings. When the drops that fall off my forehead hit the page, they’re notes.” (Irving Berlin)

With everything but a companion, in 1912, he fell hard for vocalist Dorothy Goetz. While honeymooning in Cuba, an epidemic of Typhoid Fever broke out. The newlyweds returned home, but Dorothy died from the disease. They’d been married only five months. Berlin channeled his grief into the song “When I Lost You.” It was the only song he ever admitted was directly inspired by personal experience.

Skonberg sings the poignant “What’ll I Do?” It’s a slow, affecting waltz delivered in elongated lyrics. Clarinet carries the melody. Sax swathes it in fur. “How Deep is the Ocean?” arrives filled with longing,

Twelve years later at a dinner party, the romantic met 20 year old socialite Ellin Mackay and fell head over heels. Her anti-Semitic tycoon father was dead set against the marriage and promptly sent the debutante on a world tour. The newspapers had a field day. Berlin courted her with letters. They eloped when she returned and were together 63 years.

He wrote “Always” as a wedding gift to Mackay. Ryan performs a lovely cadenced version. Flute clandestinely slips in phrases from other songs. Will likes to do this. Skonberg uses a plunger mute for wah-wah sound. A mid-tempo “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm” finds Ryan flirty. Pianist Rosano Sportiello offers a Berlin medley in fluent, crossover genres. Some are tuneful, some are impressionistic. The Andersons spotlight a solo by this international talent during every show.

At 29, having become a citizen, Berlin was inducted into the army. “Army Takes Berlin!” headlines read. Crowded quarters were bad enough but 5 a.m. reveille was impossible for this habitual late-nighter. Protesting he did his best work at night, he got himself excused from reveille. The recruit talked the army into taking it on tour as a fundraiser with him as its producer. We watch Berlin himself sing part of “Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning.”

On screen, Tommy Dorsey, Judy Garland, Bobby Darin, and Frank Sinatra perform. Twenty years after it was written, with the rise of global tensions leading up to World War II, Berlin revised “God Bless America” and introduced it to the public in 1938. His daughter called the song his “Personal expression of gratitude to the country.”

Molly Ryan, Bria Skonberg, Will Anderson, Peter Anderson

One might think this is the most recorded of Berlin’s efforts, but the record is held by “White Christmas,”  which, according to Bing Crosby, “would’ve been a mega hit if it was sung by a crow with a cleft palate.” Ryan and Skonberg duet, then follow with a playfully contentious “Anything You Can Do (I Can Do Better)”

Irving Berlin wrote an estimated 1,500 songs over his career, 25 reached #1. He scored 20 musicals and 15 films. “By the time he was 70, the world had changed. Convinced he was forgotten, he became a recluse,” Will tells us. The artist received numerous honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom. His wife Ellin passed away a year before him in 1988. Berlin was 101 when he died leaving behind an extraordinary musical legacy that continues to inspire generations.

The concert is rich and diverse, patter informative and sometimes wry, musicianship top notch.

Performance Photos by Alix Cohen

The Anderson Brothers Play Irving Berlin
Peter Anderson – tenor and soprano sax, clarinet
Will Anderson – alto sax, clarinet, flute; narrative
Rosano Sportiello – piano, Chuck Redd – drums, Neal Miner-bass
Molly Ryan- vocals
Guest:  Bria Skonberg – trumpet and vocals

Symphony Space 
2537 Broadway, at W. 95th St